THE  DEAD  CALYPSO 

AND    OTHER   VERSES 


LOUIS    ALEXANDER     ROBERTSON 


LIBRARY 

OF    THE 

UNIVERSITY  OF  CALIFORNIA. 


THE    DEAD    CALYPSO 
AND   OTHER  VERSES 


THE      DEAD     CALYPSO 
AND     OTHER     VERSES 


BY 


LOUIS    ALEXANDER  ROBERTSON 


SAN      FRANCISCO 

A.      M.      ROBERTSON 

1901 


COPYRIGHT,    1901, 

BY 
LOUIS    A.    ROBERTSON 


The  Murdock  Press 
San  Francisco 


WITH    THE    FOLLOWING    LINES 
I    INSCRIBE    THIS     LITTLE    BOOK    TO 

.  jfotman 


BY  WESTERN  SHORES  OFT  TRITON  BLOWS 
HlS  SOUNDING  SHELL  ;    AND  SHE  WHO  ROSE 
ALL  WET  AND  WANTON  FROM  THE  DEEP, 
To  MAKE  MAN'S  PULSE  WITH  PASSION  LEAP, 
HERE  ON  THE  WAVE  IN  BEAUTY  GLOWS. 

A  HERD  UPON  THE  HILLSIDE  LOWS, 
AND  WHERE  YON  STREAM  IN  MUSIC  FLOWS, 
THERE  PAN  is  PIPING  TO  HIS  SHEEP, 
BY  WESTERN  SHORES. 

HERE  VINE-CROWNED  BACCHUS  DOTH  REPOSE, 
AND  NYMPHS  AND  SATYRS,  LIKE  TO  THOSE 

OF  TEMPE,   FROM  THE  COPSES  PEEP  ; 

WHY   FOR  THE   FABLED   LOTUS  WEEP, 
WHEN  'NEATH  THE  POPPY  WE  MAY  DOZE, 
BY  WESTERN  SHORES  ? 


CONTENTS 

THE    DEAD    CALYPSO                  .              .              ,              ,              .  .     -        9 

SONNET            .              .         -   V-'-        .              .              *              .  1 7 

THROUGH    PAINTED    PANES                 .              .              .              .  .          1 8 

THE    MAN    IS    NOTHING,    THE    WORK    IS    ALL               .              V  I  9 

EVOLUTION        .              .              .              •              •              .               .  .23 

ART                 .               .               .               .               .               .                               .  33 

THE    TRUTH    SHALL    MAKE    YOU    FREE        .               .               .  '.34 

,—THOU    UNSEEN    HARP         .              .              .              .              .              .  38 

THE    WANDERER            .'              .<              .               .               .               .  '39 

DREAMS         ........  40 

WHEN    DREAMS    DERIDE                                    .     .              .               .  •          41 

ICEBERG        ........  42 

HOVE-TO             .              .              .               .               .               .               .  -43 

THE    CALIFORNIA    REDWOODS      .....  44 

DIALECT    VERSE              .               .              .              .               .               .  •          45 

THE    TUNELESS    TYRO        ......  46 

THE    REFORMED    TRANSFORMED         .....          47 

JOB  .........  48 

THE    LORD'S    PRAYER  ......          49 

VIA    CRUCIS               .......  50 

CHRISTMAS    SONNET    .......          54 

THE    CROSS-CROWNED    CAIRN      .               .              .               .              .  55 

THE    ROCK    OF    AGES                 .               .              .              .'             .  .          58 

THE    NAZARENE      .              .               .               .               .                             .  59 


CONTENTS 

GOLGOTHA         .              .              .              .               .              .              .  .          64 

TO    THE    UNKNOWN    GOD               .              .              .              .    "         .  66 

THE    LORD    OF    HOSTS               .           -..         -.              .              .  .          7 1 

HYMN    TO    FREEDOM          .               .               .              »•              .  J2 

THE    SECRET    GRASP    .              .               .              .              .              »  .          JJ 

HAVOC           ........  78 

THE    OLD    YEAR  .  .  .  .  ...          84 

JUBILATE    DEO         .               .               .               .               .                             .  85 

TENNYSON  .......  ,  ,          95 

BYRON           ........  96 

ON  A  PORTRAIT  OF  LUCIUS  HARWOOD  FOOTE          .  '97 

THERE'S  NOTHING  LIKE  THE  OLD  BALLADE         .          .  98 
ON  NEW  YEAR'S  EVE          ......     102 

VIVE    LA    BAGATELLE          .               .               .               .                .               .  103 

BIRTHDAY    SONNET      .               .               .               .              .              .  .       IO5 

THE    DEVOTEE          .              .              .              .              .              .               .  106 

FRANCESCA          .              .               .               .              .               .              .  .       Io8 

THROUGH    JOYOUS    YEARS              .               .                .                .                .  109 

ADIEU    D' AMOUR            .               .               .               .               .               .  .        IIO 

ENGLAMOURED        .               .               .                .                .                .                .  Ill 

I    LOVE    THEE    STILL                  .               .               .               .               .  .112 

THE    SUPPLICANT                 .               .               .               .              .               .  I  I  3 

THEA      .               .              .              .              .               .               .               .  .114 

WAIFS             .                .                .                .               .               .                .                .  115 

RUBRIC                  .               .               .                .                .               .              >  .        Il6 

•iN    ABSENCE               .              .              .               .           •.*.-.....  117 

LOVE    ME    ONCE    MORE             .              .               ...        .  .       Il8 

THE    IDOLATER                                     .  1 2O 


CONTENTS 

WHEN    LULU    COMES  .           >             /             •              «              ,121 

VICTOR    LOVE         *              .  .              .              .              »              ;               122 

GOOD-BY,    SWEETHEART  .              .              .              .    .      .     •         ,     .       124 

THE    TEMPTRESS     .               .  .             „              »              .              .               125 

THE  KING  is  DEAD;  LONG  LIVE  THE  KING     .          .-         .     126 

VACILLATION        .          .  ,          .         .         .         .          128 

THE  FRIAR'S  CONFESSION  *•/        .          .       ...'..'••        .129 

THE    MAENAD           .               .  .               .           .    .               .               .                I  3  I 

THE    WEDDING-BELL  .  .              .              *              .              .              .132 

A    WHITED    SEPULCHRE  ,              .              .              .              .               142 

HEAVEN    AND    HELL  »             «              .              .              .              •       H3 

A    SKETCH             ...  .              •              .              .               .               152 

A    CAROL    OF    THE    CURSED  .              .              .              .              •        J53 

THE    VAMPIRE         .              .  .              .              .              .              .               158 

IT'S    NOT    THE    DISTANCE,     IT  *S    THE    PACE,    THAT    KILLS     .       159 

MEDUSA        .              .              .  .               .              .              .              .               163 

THE    UNKNOWN    LOVE  .               .              .              .              .              .164 

-LONE    MOUNTAIN                  .  .               .               .               .               .                165 

WEARY                  .               .  .               .               .               .               .               ,l66 

PAIN                .               .               .  .               .               .               .               .                1 68 

ASHES     .               .               .  .               .                .               .               .               .169 

COMPENSATION       .              .  .              .              .              .              .               172 

TEARS      .               .               .  .               .               .               .               .               .173 

ATAXIA          .               .     '          .  .               .               .               .                .               174 

CONSOLATION                  .  .               .              .              .               .                      1 82 

OUT    OF    EGYPT     .              .  .               .              .               .               .               183 

THE    LOOM        .              .  .              .              .              .                             .       184 


THE   DEAD    CALYPSO 

WHERE  be  thy  witcheries  now,  woman  of  won 
derful  beauty, 

Priestess    of  profligate    love,   passionless,  pallid 
and  still? 

Sweet  was  the  soul-searing  cult  taught  by  thy 
liberal  kisses, 

Sweeter  the  chalice  of  love  formed  by  thy  sen 
suous  mouth, 

Ripe  as  the  rapturing  grape,  rich  as  the  rose  in 
its  redness, 

But  unto    them    that  did  drink  fatal  as  waters 
of  death. 

Left  unto  thee  are  the  dregs,  bitter  and  biting 
as  wormwood, 

Freezing  the  blood   in    thy  veins,  leaving  thee 
rigid  and  cold. 

9 


THE   DEAD    CALYPSO 

Strange  that  those  lewd  lava  lips,  once  so  alluring 
and  mocking, 

Wear  such  an  innocent  smile,  chaste  as  a  maid 
en's  in  sleep  ! 

Nay,  but  they  wither  and  change,  livid  they 
seem  unto  blueness, 

Shrunk  in  their  soft  silken  skin,  as  when  the 
tropical  sun 

Drinking  the  life  of  the  grape,  leaves  it  aban 
doned  and  shriveled, 

Gibbeted  on  its  own  vine,  swinging  like  felon 
forgot. 

Almost  again  do  I  hear  thy  voice  and  its  pas 
sionate  pleading, 

Soft  as  the  musical  moan  of  waves  in  a  mur 
muring  shell, 

Luring  and  leading  me  on  to  a  haven  that  shone 
like  a  heaven, 

10 


THE   DEAD    CALYPSO 

Bright  with  a  promise  of  peace,  fair  as  a  rhapso- 

dist's  dream. 
Misted  with  halos  of  gold,  yet  but  a  vanishing 

splendor 
Miraged   in    exquisite    grace    over  a   desert   of 

death. 

But  when  youth's  passionate  pulse  pleads  with 

its  eager  insistence, 
When  the  white  waiting  snows  of  the  heart  melt 

with  the  breath  of  the  spring, 
When  the  clamoring  currents  of  life  leap  with 

ineffable  joyance, 
Where  is  the  hand  that  can  point  to  the  channels 

through  which  they  shall  run, — 
Whether  through  vistas  of  peace,  till  lost  in  love's 

infinite  ocean, 
Or  on  through  dark  intricate  ways  to  mix  with 

the  silt  of  the  sewer? 
ii 


THE    DEAD    CALYPSO 

Dead  is  the  light  in  thine  eyes,  yet  recollection 

beholds  them 
Mirrored  like  stars  of  the  night  in  the  face  of  a 

flood  that  is  calm, 
Then   losing  themselves  in  the  deep,  when  the 

breath  of  the  gathering  tempest 
Lashes  the  slumbering  wave  till  it  leaps  to  the 

lowering  skies. 

Thus  when  thy  senses  were  drowned  in  thy 
passion's  exuberant  triumph, 

Leaving  the  lures  of  thy  lips  have  I  looked  on 
thy  wondering  eyes, 

Swooning  away  into  white,  as  when  the  rays  ot 
the  morning 

Chase  the  black  shadows  of  night  back  to  their 
caverns  of  gloom. 

Oft  have  I  seen  them  revolve,  slowly  and  dream 
ily  turning 

12 


THE   DEAD    CALYPSO 

Into  thy  love-laden  brain,  there  passion's  secret 

to  find; 
Leaving  their  opaline  orbs   blind  in  the  trance 

that  enthralled  them, 
Till  the  long  kiss  that  I  gave  coaxed  the  lost 

irises  back. 

Now,  under  curtains  of  wax,  lustreless  crescents 

of  whiteness, 
Cold    as    the   frost  on  the  pane,  hint  of  those 

rapturous  hours. 
Where  is  their  luminous  gleam,  which,  like  the 

treacherous  beacons 
Lighted  by  wreckers  to  lure   the  mariner  on  to 

his  doom, 
O'er  life's  unpiloted  sea  shone  with  a  bale  and  a 

beauty, 
Till  the  poor  credulous  bark  dashed  on  the  rock 

of  thy  heart  ? 

13 


THE    DEAD    CALYPSO 

Season  of  spring,  when  the  blood  quickened  to 

life  in  the  pulses, 
And,  murmuring,  sighed  with  delight  and  laughed 

at  the  prospect  of  death ! 
Summer    that    seethed    in    the   veins,   with   its 

grapes  growing  richer  and  redder, 
Till  in  a  wine-press  of  sorrow  the  dregs  of  the 

vintage  were  found ! 
When  all  thy  sepulchred  past,  on  the  rack  of  an 

exquisite  passion, 
Gave  up  its  secrets  of  old  in  thy  voiceless  but 

voluble  vows ; 
Then  to  thy  lust-leavened  lips  rose  the  lees  of  a 

thousand  caresses 
That  artifice  could  not  disguise,  nor  fraud  into 

fealty  frame. 

Swiftly  the  meshes  of  silk  were  spun  into  steel, 
but  I  lingered, 

14 


THE   DEAD    CALYPSO 

Fondling  the  fetters  I  feared,  yet  fearing  to  fling 

them  away. 
Lost  to  the  lips  I  had  loved,  yet  with  the  thirst 

of  a  drunkard 
Draining  the  draught  that  enslaved,  e'en  while 

the  spirit  recoiled. 
Day  after  day,  as  the  scales  fell  from  mine  eyes, 

I  beheld  thee, 
Garbed  in  the  glamour  of  lust,  rise  from  the 

ashes  of  love ; 
Night  after  night,  though  thy  beauty  oft  baffled 

my  fears  and  beguiled  me, 
Soon  every  sigh  seemed  to  breathe  naught  but  a 

sibilant  hiss, 
Or  but  the  laugh  of  a  fiend  that  rang  in  mine 

ears  till  I  left  thee, 
To  come  at  the   last   and  to  lay  the   lips  that 

forgive  on  thy  brow. 


THE    DEAD    CALYPSO 

Long,  long  ago,  in  the  past,  did  the  daughters 

of  earth,  with  their  beauty, 
Lure  from  the  heavens  above  the  white-pinioned 

Children  of  God; 
Why  should  I  wonder  that  thou,  O  fairest  and 

frailest  of  women, 
Didst  with  thy  sorceries  bind  the  souls  and  the 

bodies  of  men  ? 

Where  are    thy  worshipers  now,    they  who  did 

pant  to  embrace  thee? 
Where  is  the  homage  they  poured  once  in  those 

death-deafened  ears? 
Where  is  the  word  that  could  waken  thee  now, 

O  voluptuous  sleeper, 
Or  the  gold  that  could  bribe  thee  to  break  thy 

last  lover's  lethal  embrace? 


16 


THE   SONNET 

As  OFTEN  in  some  grand  and  ancient  fane 
A  devotee  will  kneel  him  down  to  pray 
At  one  familiar  shrine  day  after  day, 

And  to  his  guardian  saint  his  woes  complain; 

There,  while  his  fingers  tell  the  beaded  chain, 
His  soul  in  ecstasy  drifts  far  away, 

Till  back  returning  with  the  vesper  strain, 
It  enters  once  again  its  home  of  clay. 

So  in  the  cloistered  corridors  of  song 

There  is  one  altar  where  I  love  to  kneel ; 

Though  humblest  of  the  worshipers  who  throng 
Its  narrow  space,  yet  there  I  often  steal, 

And  in  the  Sonnet's  sacred  chalice  pour 

My  tears  and  sighs  until  I  weep  no  more. 


THROUGH    PAINTED   PANES 

(RONDEAU) 

THROUGH  painted  panes  a  glory  flows, 

And  over  aisle  and  altar  throws 

Soft  floods  of  crimson,  blue,  and  gold, 
Till  silent  forms,  in  sculpture  stoled, 

Seem  waking  from  a  long  repose. 

Ah,  how  the  tinted  marble  glows  ! 
For  every  cheek  now  wears  a  rose, 
And  each  white  face  seems  aureoled 

Through  painted  panes. 

These  weird  word-weavers  who  disclose 

Strange  things  to  us  in  rhyme  or  prose, 

Who  conjure  up  the  dead  and  cold, 

Or  Life's  great  varied  page  unfold, 

Their  art  is  but  a  light  that  shows 

Through  painted  panes. 
18 


THE  MAN  IS  NOTHING,  THE  WORK 
IS  ALL 

(DOUBLE  BALLADE) 

THIS  world  is  but  a  noisy  show, 

A  mighty,  motley  masquerade, 
Where  countless  actors  come  and  go, 

A  tragedy  and  gasconade, 

Where  many  puzzling  parts  are  played ; 
Till  curtained  with  Death's  dusty  pall, 

And  in  Time's  testing  balance  weighed, 
The  man  is  nothing,  the  work  is  all. 


THE   MAN   IS   NOTHING,    THE   WORK  IS   ALL 

Forward  they  press,  both  high  and  low, 

And  rich  and  poor,  and  gay  and  staid; 
Some  climb  where  Fame's  fair  mountains  glow, 

While  others  grovel  in  the  glade ; 

But  when,  at  last,  the  sexton's  spade 
Hath  built  the  bed  to  which  they  crawl, 

When  requiems  roll  and  prayers  are  prayed, 
The  man  is  nothing,  the  work  is  all. 


Though  rivers  red  as  crimson  flow 

Beneath  the  shot-torn  barricade ; 
Though  on  the  clay  of  fallen  foe 

Thrones  have  been  reared  with  reeking  blade ; 

Still  war  is  but  a  sorry  trade, 
And  often  but  a  murderous  brawl ; 

For  even  Glory's  gleam  will  fade, — 
The  man  is  nothing,  the  work  is  all. 


20 


THE   MAN   IS   NOTHING,  THE  WORK   IS  ALL 

Fate's  shuttle  flashes  to  and  fro, 
And  many  curious  webs  are  made ; 

For  Fortune  may  her  smile  bestow, 

And  light  some  dullard  through  the  shade 
To  where  Fame's  glittering  prize  is  paid ; 

While  Genius  oft  doth  drink  Life's  gall, 
Of  flouting  Fortune  unafraid, — 

The  man  is  nothing,  the  work  is  all. 


In  vilest  soil  the  seed  may  grow, 

For  many  a  living  germ  hath  strayed 
Where  sower  never  meant  to  sow ; 

The  heart  of  reckless  renegade 

Hath  been  ere  this  a  shrine  where  swayed 
Truth's  sacred  censer,  letting  fall 

The  spark,  oft  slighted,  oft  obeyed, — 
The  man  is  nothing,  the  work  is  all. 


21 


THE   MAN   IS   NOTHING,  THE  WORK   IS  ALL 

To  some  misleading  guides  we  owe 
Lights  that  have  made  us  retrograde ; 

While  others  up  Time's  ramparts  throw 
For  us  a  shining  escalade, 
By  which  we  shall  at  last  invade 

Truth's  glorious  and  eternal  hall ; 
Or  fair,  or  foul,  in  Life's  crusade, 

The  man  is  nothing,  the  work  is  all. 


ENVOY 


Whene'er  we  glory  or  upbraid 

The  good  or  bad,  the  great  or  small, 

This  maxim  may  our  judgment  aid, — 
The  man  is  nothing,  the  work  is  all. 


22 


EVOLUTION 

MYSTICAL  Dream  of  Creation  ! 
Problem  of  Dark  Evolution  ! 
Tell  us  the  world's  early  story, 

Life's  hidden  secret  unfold. 
Vain  is  each  wild  speculation, 
Groping  in  gloom  for  solution, 

Enough  that  from  darkness  sprang  glory, 
Sunrise  in  crimson  and  gold. 

23 


EVOLUTION 

Mounting  the  stream  of  the  ages, 
Up  to  its  sources  of  mystery, 
Threading  its  channels  uncertain, 
What,  after  all,  have  we  won  ? 
Blank  were  the  world's  early  pages, 
Buried  in  myth  was  its  history, 
Long  after  earth's  misty  curtain 
Glowed  with  the  light  of  the  sun. 


Still  in  the  quarried  tradition, 
Still  in  the  ice-graven  story, 
Still  in  the  rock-written  fable, 

Linger  the  throes  of  thy  birth  ; 
Marking  thy  growth  and  transition, 
Back  in  the  centuries  hoary, 
Legends  that  teach  and  enable 

Thy  children  to  know  thee,  O  Earth  ! 


EVOLUTION 

Nebulous  waif  of  obscurity, 

On  through  immensity  stealing, 
Wandering  child  of  the  forces, 

Dropped  from  the  matrix  of  night ; 
Fashioning  thyself  to  maturity, 
Sphering  and  fusing,  annealing, 

Through  the  dark  centuries'  courses, 
Drifting  along  to  the  light. 


Chaos  all  order  confounding, 
Yet  ever  silently  speeding 
On  with  instinctive  elusion, 
Steadily  holding  thy  way  ; 
Darkness  primeval  abounding, 

Down  through  the  aeons  unheeding, 
Still  amid  murky  confusion 
Blundering  on  to  the  day. 

25 


EVOLUTION 

Thundered  a  mandate  through  heaven, 
"  Let  there  be  light,"  and  the  vapors, 
Losing  themselves  in  the  ocean, 
Mingled  again  with  the  deep  ; 
Then  followed  morning  and  even, 
Night  lit  her  pale  distant  tapers, 
Order  was  born  of  commotion, 
Earth  was  awakened  from  sleep. 


Laboring  in  primal  gestation, 
Life  in  its  forms  multifarious, 
Eager  to  meet  the  sun's  kisses, 

Leaped  in  her  womb  with  delight ; 
Weary  of  long  nidulation, 

Up  from  their  wallows  lutarious, 
Up  from  their  darksome  abysses, 

Swarmed  the  strange  brood  of  the  night. 

26 


EVOLUTION 

Life  in  fantastic  variety, 

Breeding  and  battling  and  dying, 
Struggling  for  very  existence, 

Rending  with  fang  and  with  nail ; 
Death,  never  gorged  with  satiety, 
Over  the  massacre  flying, 

Blind  to  the  light  in  the  distance, 
Deaf  to  the  song  in  the  gale. 


Type  against  type  for  survival, 

Through  the  long  ages  contending, 
All  for  supremacy  striving, 

Man,  as  the  master,  they  own ; 
Brute  of  the  brutes,  without  rival, 
Up  from  the  conflict  ascending, 
Scheming,  coercing,  contriving, 
Building  the  steps  to  his  throne. 

27 


EVOLUTION 

Fatuous  child  of  mortality, 
Swaddled  in  dark  superstition, 

Groping  thy  way  through  obscurity, 
Stumbling,  but  stumbling  to  rise ; 
Casting  aside  animality, 

Girding  thyself  with  ambition, 
Fearlessly  facing  futurity, 

Scaling  the  steeps  of  the  skies. 


Race  against  race  for  dominion, 
Creed  against  creed  for  conviction, 

Throne  against  throne  for  subversion, 

Moving  like  puppets  at  play ; 
Battling  to  force  an  opinion, 
Bleeding  to  follow  a  fiction, 
Dying  with  instant  reversion, 
To  mingle  again  in  the  fray. 

28 


EVOLUTION 

Many  a  crimson  libation, 
Poured  on  barbarian  altars 
Freer  and  faster  than  water, 

Purples  thy  triumph  with  shame  ; 
Many  a  lurid  oblation, 

Smoking  to  priest-prated  psalters, 
Many  a  monster  of  slaughter 
Fiddling  a  kingdom  to  flame. 


Many  a  Moloch  of  cruelty, 
Many  a  Tophet  infernal, 
Hope,  after  gory  baptism, 

Flung  to  the  funeral  pyre  ; 
But  with  death-scorning  credulity, 
Pluming  its  pinions  eternal, 

Up  from  the  murderous  abysm, 
Springing  like  phoenix  from  fire. 

29 


EVOLUTION 

Dross  of  the  brute  disappearing, 
Lost  in  the  burning  purgation, 
Leaving  the  spirit  less  weighted, 
Less  overburdened  with  clay ; 
On  to  the  light  ever  faring, 
Toiling  in  endless  gradation, 
Lower  to  higher  translated, 
Rising  from  darkness  to  day. 


Many  a  sacred  Thermopylae 
Hurling  defiance  at  slavery ; 
Many  a  crucified  martyr 

Dying  for  love  of  his  kind  ; 
Tyranny,  kingcraft,  monopoly, 
Yielding  to  justice  and  bravery, 
Liberty's  blood-blazoned  charter 
Many  a  despot  hath  signed. 

30 


EVOLUTION 

Many  a  conquest  of  Science 
Shaming  the  warrior's  sabre ; 
Many  a  triumph  of  morals, 

Wisdom  and  Mercy  and  Love ; 
Many  a  blade  of  defiance 

Forged  to  the  ploughshare  of  labor ; 
Many  a  chaplet  of  laurels 

Wreathed  with  the  olive  above. 


Height  after  height  thou  hast  taken, 

Yet  there  are  others  remaining, 

Far  in  the  pure  empyrean 

Truth's  shining  battlements  rise ; 
Scale  them  with  courage  unshaken, 
Death  and  disaster  disdaining, 
Storm  them  with  jubilant  paean, 
Capture  the  gates  of  the  skies. 

31 


EVOLUTION 

Then  shall  all  ills  of  mortality 
Unto  thy  wisdom  surrender ; 

Knowledge  supreme  and  supernal. 

Leaving  no  summit  to  scale; 
Truth,  in  her  white-robed  reality, 
Opening  her  portals  of  splendor, 
Yielding  her  treasures  eternal, 
Lifting  Obscurity's  veil. 


ART 

THOU  breathest  on  the  cold  insensate  stone, 

And  lo  !  it  throbs  with  immortality ; 
The  canvas,  with  thy  conjuring  pigments  strown, 

Glows  with  a  beauty  that  will  never  die  ; 

The  deepest  fountains  of  the  heart  run  dry, 
When   o'er  the   trembling   strings  thy  hand  is 
thrown, 

And  when  we  hear  thy  tongue's  rich  sorcery, 
We  know  not  why  we  laugh,  or  weep,  or  moan. 

We  know  not  why,  nor  do  we  care  to  know 
Where  rise  the  waters  of  that  mystic  stream 

Whose  current  bears  us  onward  in  its  flow, 
Till,  all  unconscious  of  the  clay,  we  seem 

To  feel  the  breath  of  an  ambrosial  breeze, 

And  drift  far,  far  away  o'er  sapphire  seas. 


33 


THE    TRUTH    SHALL    MAKE    YOU 
FREE 

(DOUBLE   BALLADE) 

SINCE  we,  like  all  before, 

Must  quickly  pass  away, 
'T  is  idle  to  deplore, 

Or  weep  above  decay ; 

Since  all  who  breathe  obey 
And  bend  to  Fate's  decree, 

This  promise  be  your  stay, — 
The  Truth  shall  make  you  free. 

34 


THE   TRUTH    SHALL   MAKE   YOU   FREE 

This  freedom  bought  with  gore, 

These  shrines  at  which  you  pray, 
Your  books  with  all  their  lore, 

Do  they  the  gift  convey  ? 

The  centuries  answer,  Nay, 
But  all  the  years  to  be 

Roll  back  an  echoing  Yea, 
The  Truth  shall  make  you  free. 


To  gloomy  gods  of  yore 

Why  adoration  pay  ? 
Zeus,  Isis,  Buddha,  Thor, 

All  pass  like  common  clay ; 

Before  the  bright'ning  day 
Their  night-born  shadows  flee, 

Till  under  Reason's  sway 
The  Truth  shall  make  you  free. 

35 


THE   TRUTH    SHALL   MAKE   YOU   FREE 

Ah,  cruel  to  the  core, 

The  creeds  that  once  did  slay ; 
When  rack  with  torture  tore, 

Or  red  auto-da-fe 

Did  'round  its  victims  play ; 
A  martyred  Christ  their  plea 

To  brand  and  burn  and  flay, — 
The  Truth  shall  make  you  free. 


Though  Superstition  hoar, 
With  all  the  ages  gray, 

Should  bid  you  tread  once  more 
The  paths  that  lead  astray, 
You  '11  never  gang  a-gley 

For  beldams  such  as  she ; 
Nous  avons  tout  change, 

The  Truth  shall  make  you  free. 

36 


THE   TRUTH    SHALL   MAKE   YOU   FREE 

When  cannon  cease  to  roar, 
When  bugles  cease  to  bray, 

When  nations  never  war, 
When  all  your  skies  display 
One  circling  rainbow  ray, 

'Round  every  land  and  sea, 
Earth's  sister  stars  shall  say 

The  Truth  hath  made  you  free. 


ENVOY 


Her  temple  stands  for  aye, 
There  boldly  bend  the  knee ; 

She  speaks  not  to  betray, — 

The  Truth  shall  make  you  free. 


37 


-THOU    UNSEEN    HARP 

THOU  Unseen  Harp,  that  hangest  in  the  skies, 
Chorded  with  beams  that  stretch  from  star  to 

star, 

Thy  deep  vibrations  reach  me  from  afar, 
For  every  mighty  string  in  music  sighs 
Till  night's  dark  dome  is  rilled  with  symphonies. 
O  starry  midnight  hymns !  to  me  ye  are 
A  comfort  and  a  hope ;  no  cloud  shall  bar 
Nor  dawn  defraud  me  of  the  faith  that  flies 
On  climbing  wing  across  the  bridgeless  night, 
To  where  the  din  and  discord  of  the  day 

Can  never  reach.      Dear  faces  that  I  know, 
And  sweet  familiar  words,  my  soul  invite, 
Till  all  forgotten  is  the  shackling  clay 

That  binds  me  to  this  troublous  scene  below. 


THE   WANDERER 

THE  old  cathedral  bells  sound  sweet  and  clear, 
And  as  I  listen  to  their  well-known  peal 
A  thousand  thronging  recollections  steal 

Across  the  gulf  of  many  a  vanished  year. 

At  last  I  stand  a  wayworn  wanderer 

Within  Thy  temple,  God,  and  almost  feel 
The  presence  of  the  dead,  and  as  I  kneel 

Sweet  angel  voices  mingle  with  my  prayer. 

The  bells  are  hushed ;  the  mighty  organ  rolls 
Majestic  music  through  the  gloomy  fane ; 

A  happy  chorus  of  triumphant  souls 

With  hallelujahs  swell  the  sacred  strain ; 

A  light  celestial  fills  my  streaming  eyes, 

A  Jacob's  ladder  reaching  to  the  skies. 


39 


DREAMS 

THOU  Shoreless  Sea,  I  love  thy  murmuring  song 

That  soothes  to  slumber  with  its  drowsy  strain ; 

O'er  thy  wide  waters  drifts  the  helmless  brain, 

Manned  with  fantastic  phantoms  that  belong 

To  Sleep's  weird  world,  and  which  around  me 

throng, 

Till  with  the  dawning  day  their  shadows  wane. 
To  bind  them  on  this  page  with  inky  chain, 
*T  would  need  an  art  as  apt,  a  pen  as  strong 
As  his  who  drew  that  mighty  mutineer, 
Who  'gainst  the  God  of  Heaven  did  rebel, 
Then  from  those  ramparts  plunged  forever- 
more. 
Or  his  who  trod  the  regions  of  despair 

With   Virgil's   shade,   and   did    their   depths 

explore, 
And  calmly  talked  with  monstrous  shapes 

in  hell. 

40 


WHEN    DREAMS   DERIDE 

(RONDEAU) 

WHEN  dreams  deride,  and  Fancy's  train 
Throngs  to  enthrone  her  in  the  brain ; 
When  Reason,  ruler  of  the  day, 
Her  sober  sceptre  down  doth  lay, 
To  leave  her  sister  free  to  reign : 

Then  Memory  builds  a  wondrous  fane, 
Her  organ  rolls  a  mimic  strain, 

And  through  the  Past's  dim  aisles  I  stray, 
When  dreams  deride. 

Ah,  fictioned  fabric  !  it  were  vain 
Thy  weird  devotions  to  explain  ; 
Oft  in  thy  shadowy  shrine  I  pray 
That  sleep  might  steal  my  soul  away 
Some  morn  before  thy  cloisters  wane, 

When  dreams  deride. 
41 


ICEBERG 

LAUNCHED  on  the  bleak  waste  of  the  polar  sea, 
Where  fitful  borealis  splendors  shine, 
How  like  thou  art  to  some  majestic  shrine, 

Drifting  in  silence  to  its  destiny ! 

O  frozen,  floating  minster  !  over  thee 
The  sunset  throws  a  glory  half  divine ; 
Spellbound  we  wonder  at  thy  chaste  design, 

And  in  a  rapture  almost  bend  the  knee. 

We  seem  to  hear  a  pealing  anthem  roll 
Across  the  surface  of  the  moaning  tide, 

And  from  thy  spires  a  solemn  requiem  toll, 
As  on  to  dissolution  thou  dost  glide, 

Cradled  where  rolls  the  dark,  cold  arctic  wave, 

To  find  at  last  in  tropic  seas  a  grave. 


42 


HOVE-TO 

BAFFLED,  but  bravely,  like  a  stag  at  bay, 
She  faced  the  driving  gale  and  angry  sea ; 
Under  short  canvas  and  with  helm  a-lee, 

Hove-to,  upon  the  starboard  tack,  she  lay, 

And  looked  into  the  wind's  wild  eye  that  day ; 
Over  the  great  green  rolling  billows  she 
Rode  like  a  storm-bird,  and  did  seem  to  be 

A  mist-born  phantom  rising  from  the  spray. 

Her  tightened  weather-shrouds  rang  like  a  lyre, 
Swept  by  the  furious  storm-king  as  he  passed ; 

Wild  ocean    wraiths   wailed   in    the    thundering 

choir, 
A  thousand  demons  shrieked  in  every  blast ; 

Yet  better  thus  to  battle  with  the  gale, 

Than  drift  o'er  glassy  seas  with  listless  sail. 

43 


THE   CALIFORNIA   REDWOODS 

ERE  over  Nilus*  waking  wave  the  strain 

Of  Memnon's  morning  melody  was  blown  ; 

Ere  Cheops  from  his  quarries  clove  the  stone 
And  piled  his  pyramid  on  Egypt's  plain ; 
And  later  —  ere  the  God-projected  fane 

Of  Solomon  had  into  grandeur  grown ; 

Before  the  glory  of  the  Greek  was  known, 
Or  Romulus  the  she-wolPs  dugs  did  drain ; 

We  stood  in  youth  where  now  in  age  we  stand, 
Colossal  types  of  Life,  that  closer  climb 

To  clasp  the  stars,  than  any  living  thing. 
Ye  cherish  crumbling  temples  that  were  planned 
In  Dian's  day,  yet  deem  it  not  a  crime 
Our  older  glory  in  the  dust  to  fling. 


44 


DIALECT  VERSE 

I  LIKE  not  overmuch  the  verse  that 's  set 

In  the  rough  rustic  language  of  the  hind ; 

Though  here  and  there  a  fragrant  bud  we  find 
Hidden  among  such  weeds.     The  violet, 
Blue  as  the  skies,  with  dewy  crystals  wet, 

With  rankest  growths  hath  often  been  entwined; 
But  Art  could  never  thus  herself  forget, 

As  in  one  wreath  the  fair  and  foul  to  bind. 

The  poor  provincial's  patois  may  be  strong 
With  the  rude  eloquence  that  stirs  the  soul ; 

But  when  in  raucous  rhyme,  or  senseless  song, 
The  uncouth  verbs  and  nouns  together  roll 

In  tangled  tropes  —  then  must  I  turn  away, 

And  let  the  yokel's  sponsor  have  his  say. 


45 


THE   TUNELESS  TYRO 

A  SLEEPING  moth  upon  a  window-pane 

May   hide  the  brightest   star   that  lights  the 
gloom ; 

A  buzzing  insect  in  a  quiet  room 
May  drown  the  thunder  of  the  distant  main ; 
The  fetid,  fen-fed  breezes  may  profane 

The  fragrance  of  the  fairest  buds  that  bloom ; 

So  Art's  antitheses  do  sometimes  loom 
Large  for  a  moment,  then  —  to  nothing  wane. 

Poor   Tuneless    Tyro !    with    the    clod-clogged 

feet, — 

Groaning  beneath  an  overwhelming  weight 
Of  bad  bucolics, —  thou  wilt  linger  long 
At  Fame's  closed  portals,  and  there  vainly  bleat 
Thy  socialistic  sermons  ;  for  that  gate 

Yields  only  to  the  voice  of  deathless  song. 
46 


THE    REFORMED   TRANSFORMED 

OFT  have  I  seen  the  drunkard  full  arrayed 

In  all  the  rigor  of  the  Rechabite, 

Walking  with  face  uplifted  to  the  light, 
Sure  in  the  conquest  that  his  soul  hath  made ; 
Oft  have  I  seen  the  resolution  fade 

From  out  his  eyes,  and  marked  in  them  the 
blight 

Of  baffled  purpose,  as  the  fiends  of  night 
Shrieked  to  recall  the  righteous  renegade. 

Oh !  when  I  see  the  lips  that  Time  hath  taught 
To  triumph  o'er  the  banished  bane  begin 

To  palter  with  the  poison,  then  I  say 
That  he  who  knows  the  dice  are  loaded  ought 
To  murmur  never  if  he  fail  to  win 

When  Satan  with  him  for  his  soul  doth  play. 


47 


JOB 

MAJESTIC  Mourner  !  when  thy  spirit  moaned 
Itself  to  music  on  thy  wondrous  page ; 

When    thy   great    sorrowing   soul    in    anguish 

groaned, 

And  when  Fate  flung  tp  thee  her  galling  gage, 
Oh  !  what  a  soul-sustaining  heritage 

Was  hidden  in  the  fortitude  that  owned 
How  vain  and  weak  it  were  a  war  to  wage 

With     Him,   the    Lord,   who    sits    in    heaven 
enthroned. 

Thy  flesh  was  fed  to  foulness,  Sorrow  clad 

Thy  soul   with   sackcloth,  and   thy  forehead 

frowned 

With  the  black  ashes  of  a  heart  consumed ; 
But  through  it  all,  O  Man  of  Uz,  thy  sad 
But  sure  philosophy  thy  trials  crowned 

With   perfect   peace   that   out   of  patience 
bloomed. 

48 


THE    LORD'S   PRAYER 

OUR  Heavenly  Father,  unto  Thee  we  pour 
Our  constant  prayers,  and  bless  Thy  hallowed 

Name ! 

Come  in  Thy  kingdom,  God,  and  now  pro 
claim 

The  age  of  peace  to  last  forevermore. 
In  every  land,  from  distant  shore  to  shore, 

Through  all   the  earth    Thy   blessed  will   be 

done, 
As    where,    in    heaven,    before    Thy    shining 

throne, 
Thy  saints  and  seraphs  ceaselessly  adore. 

Give  us,  O  God,  each  day  our  daily  bread; 

Forgive  us  now,  as  others  we  forgive ; 
Guide  our  weak  feet  that  they  may  never  tread 

Temptation's  paths,  and  teach  us  how  to  live, 
That,  by  Thy  power,  we  from  the  tomb  shall  rise 
And  share  Thy  glorious  kingdom  in  the  skies. 

49 


VIA   CRUCIS 

THOU  thorn-crowned  God  of  Glory  ! 

Rejected  Nazarene ! 
I  often  read  Thy  story, 

And  linger  o'er  each  scene, 
Till,  with  rapt  wonder  gazing, 

Mine  eyes  behold  afar, 
Above  Thy  cradle  blazing, 

The  Magi's  pilot  star. 

50 


VIA   CRUCIS 

Back  through  the  night  of  ages 

I  tread  the  faith-lit  way, 
And  with  the  seers  and  sages 

My  adoration  pay. 
With  them  I  kneel  and  ponder 

Why  Thou  foredoomed  shouldst  be 
Through  all  Thy  life  to  wander, 

But  always  toward  the  tree. 


The  distant,  dismal  rafter 

Did  o'er  Thy  childhood  throw 
A  shadow  which  thereafter 

Stood  forth  a  cross  of  woe ; 
No  sound  of  mirth  or  gladness 

Was  heard  through  all  Thy  years ; 
Thy  life  was  full  of  sadness, 

Thy  cup  was  filled  with  tears. 

51 


VIA   CRUCIS 

Yet  in  Thy  love  revealing 

A  mercy  all  could  claim, 
Sustaining,  cheering,  healing 

The  sick,  the  blind,  the  lame ; 
Consoling  and  forgiving, 

Thy  hands  above  them  spread,- 
O  Lips  that  cheered  the  living ! 

O  Voice  that  waked  the  dead ! 


Yet  sorrow  was  Thy  guerdon, 

And  grief  was  ever  near, 
And  mindful  of  the  burden 

That  Thou  wert  doomed  to  bear, 
Through  gathering  gloom  extended 

Thy  path  of  pain,  until 
Thy  bleeding  footsteps  wended 

Up  Calvary's  dark  hill. 

5* 


VIA   CRUCIS 

Through  darkness  there  directing 

The  way  that  Thou  must  go, 
Its  shadow  still  reflecting 

Along  Thy  path  of  woe, 
The  ancient  auguration, 

Fulfilled,  at  last  doth  rise 
In  black-sparred  consummation, 

To  lift  Thee  to  the  skies. 


Thy  breaking  heart  presages 

The  end  that  now  is  nigh ; 
But  soon,  O  Light  of  Ages 

And  Dayspring  from  on  high, 
Through  clouds  of  glory  cleaving, 

Thy  soul  shall  find  the  light, 
Behind  Thee  ever  leaving 

Darkness  and  death  and  night. 

53 


CHRISTMAS   SONNET 

FAITH-FOUNDED  Vision  of  the  Manger,  rise 
In  all  thy  humble  glory  and  unfold 
Time's  dusty  leaves,  until  thy  page  of  gold 

Shines  through  the  ages  on  our  wondering  eyes. 

From  out  the  starry  silence  of  the  skies 
A  mighty  flood  of  harmony  is  rolled, 
Once  more  the  song  is  sung,  the  story  told, 

And  cradled  on  the  earth  a  Saviour  lies. 

What  priests  and  prophets  did  with  faith  foretell, 

We,  looking  backward,  with  clear  eyes  can  see 

The  thorn-crowned  God  forsake  His  throne 

above ; 

We  hear  the  chorus,  but  we  hear  as  well 
The  midnight  moan  in  dark  Gethsemane, 
And  sink  o'erwhelmed  beneath  His  bound 
less  love. 

54 


THE   CROSS-CROWNED   CAIRN 

A  WHISPERED  prayer,  a  stone  with  reverent  hand 
Laid  near  a  cross  that  on  a  cairn  doth  stand, — 
This  and  no  more ;  no  fragrant  buds  to  wreathe 
A  garland  for  the  silent  dead  beneath ; 
No  requiem  rolling  on  the  desert  air 
To  guide  us  to  the  lonely  sleeper  there ; 
No  rudely  written  legend  to  proclaim 
His  birth,  his  death,  his  country,  age,  or  name  ; 
Yet  never  vault,  from  dark  Machpelah's  cave, 
Where  Israel's  primal  Patriarch  found  a  grave ; 
Nor  yet  the  dome  that  Artemisia  raised 
O'er  Caria's  king,  at  which  a  world  amazed 
In  wonder  stood ;  nor  Gizeh's  gloomy  pile, 
Housing  the  haughtiest  Pharaoh  by  the  Nile  ; 
Nor  sacred  shrine,  nor  quiet  cloistered  fane, 
Wherein  the  proudest  dust  of  earth  hath  lain, 

55 


THE   CROSS-CROWNED    CAIRN 

E'er  sent  a  softer  slumber  than  these  stones 
That  shelter  from  the  sun  a  wanderer's  bones. 

The  prayers  we  pray,  our  dirges  of  distress, 
'Neath  carven  arch,  or  in  the  wilderness, 
What  are  they  to  the  dead  ?    Oh,  who  can  say 
Where  the  dread  Spoiler  pauses, — if  the  clay 
Alone  surrenders  to  his  blighting  breath, 
Or  whether  down  the  sombre  stream  of  death, 
The  spirit,  drifting  into  darkness,  dies, 
As  did  this  flesh  beneath  these  burning  skies  ? 

It  is  not  so  !     The  Symbol  that  doth  keep 

Its  lonely  vigil  on  yon  stony  heap 

Is  eloquent,  and  tells  of  Him  who  first 

Did   through   Death's  black,  unbroken  barriers 

burst ; 

Of  Him  on  whom  a  world  hath  learnt  to  lean, 
And  from  the  darkest  hours  of  grief  to  glean 

56 


THE   CROSS-CROWNED    CAIRN 

The  Hope  that  helps  when  other  comforts  fail, 
The  Faith  that  falters  not  before  the  veil, 
The  Love  that  prays  —  in  every  Christian  land, 
When  in  the  presence  of  the  dead  we  stand  — 
That  though  the  dreamless  dust  may  never  wake, 
The  soul  may  somewhere  see  the  morning  break. 


57 


THE   ROCK   OF   AGES 

I  AM  the  Babe  that  in  the  manger  lay, 

The  mystic  offspring  of  the  mother-maid  ; 
I  am  the  Christ  whose  pale  and  suffering  clay 

Was  the  great  price  for  man's  salvation  paid ; 

I  am  the  God  to  whom  a  world  has  prayed 
For  nineteen  hundred  years.     I  am  the  Way, 

The  Truth,  the  Life,  the  comfort  and  the  stay, 
To  whom  despairing  mortals  look  for  aid. 

Faith-faggots,  kindled  in  the  furious  light 
Of  bigot  hate,  like  wrecking  beacons  gleam 
Across  the  crimson  waves  that  beat  Time's 

shore ; 

But  through  the  wildest  storm  and  darkest  night 
I  stand  the  Rock  of  Ages,  and  My  beam 
Leadeth  and  saveth  those  whose  hearts  are 

pure. 

58 


THE   NAZARENE 

A  MANGER-CRADLED  Child,  His  mother  near, 
And  one  they  call  His  father  standing  by, 
Shepherds  and  Magi,  with  the  gifts  they  bear, 
An  angel-chorus  rolling  through  the  sky, — 
Once  more  the  sacred  mystery  we  scan, 
And  wonder  if  the  Christ  be  God's  best  gift  to 
man. 


Pale,  patient  Pleader  for  the  poor  and  those 
Whose  hearts  are  homes  of  sorrow  and  of 

pain, 
Thy  voice  is  as  a  balm  for  all  their  woes ; 

Through  twenty  centuries  it  calleth  plain 
As  when  it  breathed  the  invitation  blest, — 
Ye  weary,  come  to  Me,  and  I  will  give  you  rest. 


59 


THE   NAZARENE 

We  mark  Thy  miracles,  but  would  not  bring 

Them  to  the  test  of  Reason's  crucible. 
What  profit  were  it  such  full  faith  to  fling 
To  unbelief's  wild  winds  ?     Oh,  who  can 

tell 

The  sacred  secrets  hidden  by  the  veil 
That  Reason  cannot  rend  nor  mortal  man  assail  ? 


Why  should  we  doubt  that  Thou  didst  walk 

the  wave, 

That  Thou  didst  still  the  storm  on  Galilee, 
That  Thou  didst  summon  Lazarus  from  his 

grave, 

Or  mad'st  the  leper  clean,  the  blind  to  see  ? 
Oh,  for  the  faith  that  hath  the  power  to  burn 
Bright  through  these  skeptic  mists,  though  Reason 
from  it  turn ! 

60 


THE   NAZARENE 

But   most   we  love   Thee  for  the  voice  that 

blessed 

The  little  children  when  they  came  to  Thee, 
And  for  the  human  heart  within  Thy  breast 

That  beat  for  all,  but  bled  for  misery ; 
And  for  the  hand  stretched  down  in  love  to 

greet, 
That  lifted  back  to  life  the  woman  of  the  street. 


For  things  like  these  our  hearts  can  under 
stand, — 

All,  all  is  human,  nothing  doth  beguile ; 
But  Thy  great  deeds  such  credence  do  demand 

That  Faith  and  Reason  fail  to  reconcile. 
Is  that  within  our  breasts  a  fabled  hope  ? 
Oh,  leave  it  undisturbed,  lest  in  the  gloom  we 


grope  ! 


61 


THE   NAZARENE 

Fond  fictions  of  our  faith !  though  Science  turn 
Her  searchlight  on    the  past,  and   Reason 

scorn, 
What  comfort  give  they  when  the  soul  doth 

yearn 
For  that  pure  peace  that  passeth  all  things 

born 

Of  human  knowledge  ?    Then  Thy  mystic  birth, 
Thy   life,    Thy   love,   Thy  death  declare  Thy 
saving  worth. 

Then  let  the  wrecking  infidel  proclaim 

His  creedless  course  o'er  Life's  uncertain  sea. 
What  knows  he  of  the  faith  that  Thou  didst 

frame, 

That  falters  not  to  face  eternity  ? 
The  grave,  his  gloomy  goal,  is  but  a  door 
Through  which  we  pass  to  life,  as  Thou  didst 

pass  before. 

62 


THE   NAZARENE 

Reason  may  seek  to  ruin,  Science  scorn, 

But  that  great  love  of  Thine  hath  made  us 

wise 
In  wisdom  not  of  understanding  born, 

That  bids  us  turn  to  Thee  with  longing  eyes 
And  outstretched  hands.  We  know  that  Thou 

art  He, 
Nor  do  we  seek  a  sign,  as  did  the  Pharisee. 


Sweet  festival  that  bringeth  back  once  more 

The  golden  dreams  of  childhood,  let  us  turn 
Like  little  children  to  the  Christmas  lore 
That  once  did  hold  us  spellbound,  till  we 

learn 

Again  the  lesson  of  Thy  love ;  for  we 
Must  be  like  children,  Lord,  ere  we  can  come  to 
Thee. 


GOLGOTHA 

(A    SONNET    OF    THE    CROSS) 

MORN  hid  her  face,  and  day  was  backward  rolled, 
Mysterious  rumblings  shook  the  sacred  hill, 
In  ghastly  wonder  there,  shrouded  and  chill, 

Uprose  the  dead,  Christ's  passing  to  behold ; 

Waked  stalkers,  from  your  couches  in  the  mould 
Weird  miracles  ye  saw,  portending  ill ; 

God's  days  of  flesh  were  o'er,  His  moments  told, 
A  prayer  groaned  through  His  lips,  then  all 
was  still. 

His  crown  of  thorns,  His  bleeding  hands  and 

feet, 

That  fatal  drain  sped  by  the  soldier's  spear, 
A  fountain  whence  Mercy's  encrimsoned  tide 

64 


GOLGOTHA 

Flows  free  to  all ;  one  short  forgiving  prayer, 
Then  soared    His   soul;    man's  ransom  was 

complete, 

The   world's    great    price   was   paid   when 
Christos  died. 


The  Saviour's  last  words,  "My  God!  My  God!  why  hast  Thou  forsaken  me?" 
with  the  exception  of  the  word  "  why  "  are  woven  into  the  above  sonnet,  in  regular 
order,  and  form  a  cross.  As  only  twenty-eight  letters  could  be  used,  the  word  referred 
to  was  omitted. 

Begin  with  the  first  letter  of  the  first  line,  then  the  second  of  the  second,  the  third 
of  the  third,  and  so  on  up  to  the  fourteenth  of  the  fourteenth;  then  the  first  of  the 
fourteenth,  the  second  of  the  thirteenth,  and  back  in  like  manner  to  the  fourteenth  of 
the  first. 


TO   THE    UNKNOWN   GOD 

SUPREME,  Unknown,  whom  yet  we  trace 
But  dimly  through  a  darkened  glass, 
When  shall  the  mists  that  hide  Thee  pass, 

And  we  behold  Thee  face  to  face  ? 

For  countless  ages  we  have  trod 
The  lower  trails  that  lead  to  Thee ; 
Now  on  the  distant  heights  we  see 

The  banners  of  the  hosts  of  God. 

A  thousand  gods  have  we  confessed, 
And  warped  our  worship  age  by  age, 
Creed  blotting  creed  from  off  the  page, 

An  ever-changing  palimpsest. 
66 


TO   THE   UNKNOWN   GOD 

Long  through  the  gloom  Thy  skies  we  scanned,- 
We  cried  to  Thee,  but  Thou  wert  dumb ; 
Yet  Faith  oft  heard  a  whispered  "  Come/' 

And  Fancy  felt  a  guiding  hand. 

Confirming  our  audacious  guess, 

Thy  lightnings  clove  the  clouds  and  seemed 
To  write  amen  to  all  we  dreamed, 

Thy  crashing  thunders  answered  Yes. 

Altars  and  fanes  to  Thee  we  raised, 
Built  on  one  vague  but  constant  hope, 
That  taught  us  through  the  gloom  to  grope, 

While  on  the  silent  stars  we  gazed. 

We  searched  the  skies  for  Thee,  then  turned 

The  glass  upon  the  atom,  till 

We  saw  the  life  within  it  thrill 
To  clasp  the  mightiest  star  that  burned. 

67 


TO   THE   UNKNOWN   GOD 

Life  yearning  unto  Life  —  the  spark 
Within  the  seed  that  bursts  the  sod 
Claims  kindred  with  an  unknown  God, 

But  never  leaps  the  bridgeless  dark. 

Hope  crying  in  the  gloom,  a  child 
Amid  strange  lights  and  shadows  lost, 
'Twixt  doubt  and  fear  perplexed  and  tossed, 

By  any  whispered  word  beguiled. 

Unfaltering  Faith  may  seek  to  tear 
And  sweep  the  baffling  veil  aside ; 
We  know  not  if  the  dead  deride 

Her  efforts,  but  the  living  hear 

Death  laughing  ever  at  her  creed, 
Blighting  each  promise  ere  it  bloom, 
Till  all  the  past  seems  but  a  tomb, 

And  every  hope  a  broken  reed. 
68 


TO   THE   UNKNOWN   GOD 

A  tomb  !  a  broken  reed  !  Ah  no  ! 
We  die,  but  dying  leave  behind 
That  which  may  teach  us  yet  to  find 

Where  Life's  immortal  waters  flow. 

A  thousand  ages  yet  unborn, 

Pregnant  with  promises  that  cast 
Their  beams  before,  may  bring  at  last 

The  birth-blaze  of  the  coming  morn. 

Within  the  growing  light  we  fade 
With  all  the  things  of  yesterday 
That  swift-paced  Progress  flings  away, 

Or  Science  scoffs  into  the  shade. 

Or  as  the  scattered  fragments  fly 
Beneath  the  Builder's  hand,  so  we 
Fall  from  the  fabric  that  shall  be 

A  temple  lifted  to  the  sky. 
69 


TO   THE   UNKNOWN   GOD 

Or  is  it  Babel  that  we  build 

Age  after  age  upon  our  dead  ? 

And  is  our  faith  a  fiction  fed 
On  dreams  as  vain  as  those  that  filled 

The  sons  of  Noah  when  they  toiled 
And  piled  the  tower  on  Shinar's  plain  ? 
Oh  !  is  the  hope  we  cherish  vain. 

And  at  the  last  shall  we  be  foiled  ? 

Nay,  when  far  future  years  have  passed, 
Our  lives  shall  not  have  been  for  naught ; 
For,  out  of  bleak  oblivion  brought, 

We  shall  behold  Thy  face  at  last. 


70 


« 

THE   LORD   OF   HOSTS 

FIGMENT  of  hoary  myth  and  outworn  creed, 
Born  of  the  thunder-peal  and  blazing  rift 
That  lighted  earth's  dark  dawn,  to  Thee  we  lift 

Our  hands  and  cry  for  succor  as  we  bleed. 

Jove  and  Jehovah,  Allah,  Mars,  and  Thor, 
All  held  the  cloudy  throne  where  now  we  kneel 
To  beg  Thy  blessing  on  the  flashing  steel 

That  lights  our  legions  through  the  mists  of  war. 

Alas  !  we  linger  still  in  Janus'  fane, 

And  watch  the  twin-faced  god  glare  east  and 

west, 
While  Mammon  mocks  the  Martyr  on  the 

Tree. 
The  angel  seen  by  shepherds  on  the  plain 

Comes  once  again,  but  comes  in  armor  dressed, 
The  herald  of  a  darker  deity. 
71 


HYMN   TO    FREEDOM 

BLOOD-BOUGHT,  and  yet  the  price  was  freely 

paid, 

As  many  a  crimsoned  battle-field  could  tell ; 
And  thunder  tread  of  war,  and  clash  of  blade, 
And  the  glad  clanging  birth-song  of  a  bell ; 
Then  one  bright  torch  that  blazed  above  the 

gloom, 

As  Liberty  leaped  forth  and  sealed  Oppression's 
doom. 

The  grit  and  grandeur  of  the  men  who  poured 

Their  blood  to  buy  this  priceless  heritage, — - 

They  whose  quick  hands  ne'er  trifled  with  the 

sword, 
Nor  trembled  when  they  signed  the  chartered 

page, 

Sleep  in  the  soil  they  saved,  and  yet  they  rise 
And  look  on  us  to-day  with  stern  demanding 

eyes. 

72 


HYMN   TO    FREEDOM 

What  were  it  worth,  this  birthright  of  the  free, 

If  we,  as  careless  keepers  of  the  trust, 
The  byword  of  a  world  at  last  should  be  ? 
Ye  glib-tongued  sophists !  shall  our  sabres 

rust? 

Beware,  ye  Babel-builders,  lest  these  towers 
That  climb  to   kiss  the  stars,  should  fall  when 
Treason  glowers ! 


What  can  we  claim,  when  in  the  scales  of  God 

We  throw  the  patriot  prestige  of  the  past  ? 
Our  fathers'  blood,  long  silent  in  the  sod, 
Begins    to    mourn ;    yea,  though    we  now 

should  cast 

Into  the  balance  every  deathless  name 
That  lights  our  sacred  scroll,  't  would  light  us  to 
our  shame, 


73 


HYMN   TO   FREEDOM 

If  we,  as  watchers  of  a  nation's  fate, 

While   all  our    skies    above  are  rainbow- 

spanned, 
Forget  the  stealthy  foe  within  our  gate, 

Or   the    broad,  rugged    creed    our    fathers 

planned. 

What  is  it  worth,  this  liberty  we  boast, 
While  rank  Corruption's  growth  spreads  thick 
from  coast  to  coast, 


While  perjured  politicians  with  a  bait 

Of  luring  lies  ensnare  a  people's  vote, 
While  journalistic  scavengers  can  freight 

With    filth    the    sheets    that    through    the 

country  float, 

While  Justice  weeps  to  see  upon  her  throne 
A  bought  and  bloated  thing  that  boodlers  boldly 
own? 


74 


HYMN   TO    FREEDOM 

For  less  than  this  methinks  the  hero  clay 
That   stood   our    bulwark    oft   against   the 

foe 
Would  rise  to  save  its  country  from  decay, 

Did  not  this  deadly  upas  ofer  it  grow ; 
Shame  be  it  that  its  poisoned  branches  spread 
Their  blasting  shade  above  the  soil  that  holds 
such  dead  ! 


What  time  a  deadlier  devastating  blight 
Than  this  or  any  country  ever  knew 
Dared  lift  its  ghastly  features  to  the  light, 
A  million  blades  'round  Freedom's  banner 

drew. 

Now  let  Corruption  check  these  dastard  hordes, 
Or   soon   the  grass  we  tread   will   glisten   into 
swords. 


75 


HYMN   TO   FREEDOM 

Then,  slumber  on,  ye  brave,  and  have  no  fear ; 
We  stand  beside   our  watch-fires,  and  our 

eyes, 
Fixed  on  God's  changeless  stars,  see,  shining 

clear, 

The  light  that  saves.     Yea,  we  shall  realize 
The  faith-framed  fabric  of  your  morning  dream, 
And  clasp  the  captured  grail  that  guides  us  with 
its  gleam. 


For,  as  our  fathers  did,  we  turn  to  Thee, 

Great  God  of  Nations,  and  we  rest  secure ; 
Our  eyes  behold  across  Time's  troublous  sea, 

A  pharos  flaming  high  above  the  roar 
Of  baffling  tempest  and  of  changing  tide, — 
Triumphant  type  that  tells  of  wrecking  storms 
defied. 


76 


THE   SECRET   GRASP 

THESE  mongrel  miscreants  from  o'er  the  sea 
Would  any  country,  any  cause  betray, 
As  witness  our  own  civil  war,  when  they 
In  scores  of  thousands  from  the  flag  did  flee. 
Let  everlasting  shame  be  ours  if  we 

Should  in   one  balance   their   black    perjuries 

weigh 
'Gainst  England's  friendship  !    Shall  we  thus 

repay 

The  mighty  service  rendered  us,  when  she 
Stretched  forth  her  arm  and  held  the  world  aloof 
While,  with  a  secret  grasp  and  whispered  word, 
She  strained  Neutrality's  stern  laws  and  gave 
Of  blood  and  brotherhood  such  sterling  proof, 
That  Europe's  marshaled  millions  never  stirred, 
Though  Spain  cried  loud  to  them  for  help 
to  save  ? 

77 


HAVOC 

WAIT  till  these  ragged  vagabonds  now  swarming 

o'er  the  land 
Are  clothed  and  fed,  and  drilled  and  led,  and  feel 

the  guiding  hand 

Of  some   clear-headed    leader,    born   upon   the 

battle-field, 
Some  new  Napoleon  of  the  West,  whose  iron 

hand  can  wield 

The  sceptre  equal  with  the  sword,  some  daring 

son  of  Mars, 
Some  hero  of  a  hundred  fights,  who  laughs  at 

death  and  scars ; 

78 


HAVOC 

Wait  till  his  marching  myriads  come,  poor  vaga 
bonds  no  more, 

But  every  one  a  soldier  trained,  a  dog  of  death 
and  war. 

Straining  until  the  leash  is  slipped,  these  human 

hounds  of  hell, 
Armed  to  the  teeth,  crime  in  their  hearts,  rushing 

with  angry  yell 

Down  on  your  crowded  cities  there,  where  loot 

and  beauty  stand 
Easy  to  pluck,  like  ripened  fruit,  by  any  daring 

hand. 

Nay,  smile  not  in  derision,  for  be  sure  that  day 

will  come, — 
You  '11    see   their    bayonets   glitter,  you  '11   hear 

their  rolling  drum. 
79 


HAVOC 

E'en   now  the  moaning  of  the  storm  is  in  the 

distance  heard, — 
Yea,  even   now  the  tranquil    sky  with  thunder 

clouds  is  blurred. 

They're  swelling  big  and  bigger  still,  and  yet 

you  sit  and  smile, 

Secure  behind  your  money-bags   but  for  a  little 
while. 

For  soon  the  awful  storm  will  burst  upon  you 

like  a  flood, 
The  gutters  of  your  crowded  streets  will  overflow 

with  blood. 

What  right  divine  do  you  possess  ?     What  angel 

guards  your  door  ? 
Listen,  and  down  a  hundred  years  you  still  can 

tne   roar 

80 


HAVOC 

Of  frantic  Frenchmen  dancing  'round  the  crim 
soned  guillotine, 
Drunk  with  the  blood  of  gentlemen,  of  nobles, 

king  and  queen. 

*  • 

And  still,  poor  idiots,  do  you  smile,  secure  behind 

your  gold, 
When  heads  a  thousand  times  more  firm  have  in 

the  basket  rolled. 

Remember  that  the  wealth  you  hoard,  got  by 

your  scheming  skill, 
Will  never  purchase  safety  then, —  these  demons 

hunt  to  kill. 

You  Ve  often  clothed  and  fed  them,  too,  but  now 

no  trifling  sop, 
Though   thrown  in  haste  before  his  jaws,  this 

Cerberus  can  stop. 
81 


HAVOC 

With  murder  in  his  hellish  heart,  he  wants  both 

blood  and  gold  ; 
He   only  knows  that  you  are  rich,  that  he  is 

starved  and  cold. 

"Down  with  the  rich!"    his   battle-cry,   "The 

people  shall  be  free  !  " 
Freedom   for  them !      You    gave  it  when  you 

called  them  o'er  the  sea, — 

The  vice,  the  crime,  the  scum,  the  slime  of  every 

foreign  land, 
And  over  them  your  aegis  threw,  and  grasped 

each  traitor  hand. 

Now  you  shall  reap  the  harvest  that  by  your 
selves  was  sown, 

And  tread  the  burning  ploughshare  with  many  a 
bitter  groan. 

82 


HAVOC 


You  fought  about  the  negro  once;  now  for  your 
selves  take  care, — 

There 's  treachery  around  you,  and  there 's  mur 
der  lurking  near. 


THE   OLD   YEAR 

THE  year  is  dying  with  its  hopes  and  fears, 

Its  few  faint  smiles,  its  many  bitter  tears ; 

Another   comes   when    strikes    the   midnight 

hour, — 

Will  Fortune  light  my  path,  or  will  it  lower 
With  Disappointment's  clouds  ?     Beyond  the 
power 

Or  ken  of  aught  of  mortal  birth  to  say, 

The  evil  is  sufficient  to  the  day. 

And  they,  I  ween,  are  happiest  who  defy 
Sunshine  or  shadow,  bright  or  cloudy  sky, 
And  to  the  future  look  with  calm  philosophy. 


84 


JUBILATE   DEO 

RIGHTEOUS     Ruler,    Royal    Lady,    throned    in 

majesty  and  splendor, 
Thou  before  whose  matchless  prestige  all  the 

past  and  present  pale, 
Hear  the  world-encircling  chorus  which  thy  many 

millions  render, 

Hear  our  mighty  Jubilate,— Sovereign-Queen 
and  Empress,  hail ! 

While  thy  white-walled  island  shaketh  with  the 

message  that  is  pouring 
From  thy  thunder-throated  warders  as  they  tell 

it  to  the  deep, 
While  the  heaven-storming  anthem  now  above 

the  clouds  is  soaring, 

While  the  bounding  heart  of  Britain  doth  with 
exultation  leap, 

85 


JUBILATE   DEO 

All  along  the  seas  the  echo  rolleth  till  earth's 

corners  listen; 
Mighty  marts   and   commerce-crowded   ports 

and  rivers  hear  it  swell, 
Lonely  islands  of  the  ocean,  set  in  tropic  tides 

that  glisten 

Into  gladness,  speed  it  onward,  and  the  tale  of 
triumph  tell. 


Where  the  dawn  of  new  dominion  into  splendid 

noon  is  glowing, 
And  the  bright  prophetic  legend  over  Afric 

skies  is  scrolled, 

Where  thy  sons  the  seeds  of  empire  with  ambi 
tious  hands  are  sowing, 

There  they  think  of  thee  and   England,  and 
their  song  is  skyward  rolled. 

86 


JUBILATE   DEO 

Hark !    while    India's    dusky   myriads   in   their 

many  tongues  proclaim  thee ; 
Mighty  Empress  of  the  East,  three  hundred 

millions  to  thee  call ; 
There  from  Scinde  to  far  Sadiya,  now  again  we 

hear  them  name  thee, 

Now  again    their   mingling  voices    ring  from 
Gilgit  down  to  Galle. 


Where  in  unfamiliar  beauty  night's  bright  lamps 

are  hung  in  heaven, 
While  the  starry  crux  is  dying  in  the  dawn  of 

austral  skies, 
There  the  cannonading  chorus  flashes  forth  from 

lips  of  levin, 

And  o'er  sunny  seas  of  sapphire  on  from  isle 
to  island  flies. 

87 


JUBILATE   DEO 

Drowned  to-day  the  mighty  music  of  Niagara's 

falling  river. 
Lost   in   pure    Pacific   paeans,  mingling   with 

Atlantic's  roar; 
Mountain,  field,  and  lake  are  listening,  into  life 

the  forests  quiver, 

For  they  hear  Vancouver  calling  unto  lonely 
Labrador. 


Many  a  bivouac  and  barrack  hears  the  reveille 

rejoicing, 
Many  a   citadel   and   fortress   frowning   over 

foreign  foam 
Knows  the  music  of  that  bugle,  and  with  tongues 

of  thunder  voicing 

Forth  a  great  lo  Triumphe,  rolls  an  answering 
message  home. 

88 


JUBILATE   DEO 

Where  the  sheltering  flag  of  England  over  land 

and  sea  is  streaming, 
Where  beneath  a  foreign  banner  British  hearts 

beat  quick  with  pride, 
Where   across    the    trackless   waters    England's 

ships  are  swiftly  steaming, 
Where    her  barks  with   tempest  battle,  or  at 
anchor  safely  ride, 


There  thy  liegemen  now  salute  thee,  for  wherever 

they  may  wander, 
'Neath  that  flag  is  always  England,  but  to-day 

it  is  a  shrine, 
Where  they  kneel  and  on  her  thousand  years 

of  matchless  glory  ponder, 
Rising  never  to  forget  the  brightest  of  them  all 
are  thine. 


JUBILATE   DEO 

Where  the   home   and   hearth   are  sacred,  yea, 

wherever  women  glory 
In   the   virtue   that   doth  vanquish,  where  in 

every  land  they  dwell, 
For  long  years  they  've  learnt  to  love  and  linger 

o'er  thy  stainless  story, 

And  a  world   of  women's  voices  of  another 
empire  tell. 


Golden  mists  of  sixty  summers  melt  and  we  again 

behold  thee 
Maiden-monarch,  sceptred,  symboled,  throned 

and  crowned  as  England's  Queen, 
There  the  promise  of  the  present  with  its  glory 

aureoled  thee, 

While  the  ancient  Abbey's  arches  never  bent 
o'er  grander  scene. 

90 


JUBILATE   DEO 

Then  we  see   thee   wife  and  mother, —  tranquil 

days  of  joy  whose  fleetness 
Grandeur,  glory,  power,  and  prestige  could  not 

for  one  moment  stay, — 
Days  that  dawned  in  peace  and  compassed  every 

rare  domestic  sweetness, 

Till  a  life-enshrouding  shadow  fell  across  thy 
cloudless  way. 


From  thy  lips  the  lurking  Spoiler  dashed  the  cup 

of  all  thy  gladness, — 
O  ye  Mountains  of  Gilboa !   tears  were  then 

your  dews  and  rain ; 
Then  from  Dan  to  Beersheba  all  the  land  was 

filled  with  sadness, 

For  our  tears  with  thine  were  mingled  when 
thy  lofty  mate  was  slain. 

91 


JUBILATE   DEO 

Ah,  we  miss  thy  minstrel  Merlin,  who  with  swift, 

unfaltering  fingers, 
Taught    the     sounding     Harp     of    England 

Honor's  hymn  and  Sorrow's  tale ; 
Over  many  a  song  immortal,  sung  to  thee,  how 

Memory  lingers, 

Till  we  almost   hear   his   voice    and   see  the 
guiding  gleam  and  grail. 


Nay,  the  gleam  is  ever  with  us ;   thou  for  sixty 

years  hast  worn  it, — 
'T  is  the  guiding  light  of  England,  Glory's  star 

and  Honor's  ray ; 
On    thy    forehead    now   it    resteth,    Truth    and 

Righteousness  adorn  it, 

And  it  still  shall  lead  us  onward  as  it  lights 
our  path  to-day. 

92 


JUBILATE   DEO 

Now  though  Court  and  Camp  and  Cloister,  Art 

and  Song  around  thee  cluster, 
Till  the  glory  that  enfolds  thee  seemeth  more 

of  heaven  than  earth, 
Yet  it  cannot  for  one  moment  blind  us  to  the 

brighter  lustre 

Of  the  faith  that  never  faltered,  of  the  woman's 
splendid  worth. 


Though  with  triumph  and  with  pageant  and  with 

paean  we  extol  thee, 
As  we  lift  thee  and  enthrone  thee  on  the  height 

of  England's  fame, 
Yet   thy  three-times-twenty    years  of  blameless 

womanhood  enroll  thee 

With  a  halo  that  outshineth  all  thy  gemmed 
tiara's  flame. 


93 


JUBILATE   DEO 

Now  unto  the  King  of  Kings,  the  Lord  of  Hosts, 

the  God  of  Nations, 
Onjwhose  Truth,  for  strength   and   wisdom, 

thou  with  fearless  faith  dost  lean, 
While  the  prayer  and  psalm  are  mingling  with  an 

empire's  acclamations, 

Unto  Him  we  do  commend  thee,  Sovereign 
Lady,  Empress,  Queen. 


94 


TENNYSON 

His  was  the  hand  to  strike  our  English  lyre, 
And  his  the  voice  to  answer  to  its  tone ; 
From  the  low  cottage  to  the  lofty  throne, 

In  roaring  London,  or  in  sleeping  shire, 

We  knew  the  beacon  gleam  of  Merlin's  fire. 
Long  as  our  language  lives  the  world  shall  hear 
His  clarion  notes  still  ringing  loud  and  clear, 

The  purest  voice  in  our  celestial  choir. 

He  sang  of  love,  and  lo  !  our  brimming  eyes 
Flowed  over  as  we  thought  of  fair  Elaine ; 

He  sang  of  death  in  stately  harmonies, 
And  half  relieved  it  of  its  grief  and  pain  : 

Whene'er  the  trembling  chords  his  fingers  swept, 

The  world  stood  silent,  or  with  gladness  wept. 


95 


BYRON 

THOU   Master   Minstrel !    through  whose  won 
drous  strain, 

Rebellious  notes  of  fierce  defiance  ring ; 

For  thy  deformity  did  to  thee  bring 
A  bitterness  that  frenzied  heart  and  brain, 
And  galled  thy  restless  spirit  like  a  chain. 

Thy  tongue  was  sharper  than  an  adder's  sting, 

And  quick  and  far  its  venom  it  could  fling, 
Or  blight,  or  blast,  or  wither  with  disdain. 

But  in  thy  matchless  measures  thou  didst  paint 
Love's  loveliest  scenes,  and  such  a  glamour 

throw 

O'er  sin's  soft  errors,  that  we  almost  kneel 
To  each  frail  beauty  as  to  some  fair  saint ; 
The  flowery  path  seems  not  to  lead  to  woe, 
Thy  rich  red  roses  all  its  thorns  conceal. 
96 


ON  A  PORTRAIT    OF    LUCIUS    HAR- 
WOOD    FOOTE 

WHEN  Art's  apt  fingers  almost  show  the  mind, 

And  Genius  doth  unto  the  canvas  lend 
The  look  of  life,  the  colors  thus  combined 

In  an  immortal  masterpiece  do  blend ; 
Though  skilfully  and  well  hereon  are  laid 

The  conjuring  pigments,  yet  when  Time  shall 

stain 
And  dust  bedim,  a  voice  from  out  the  shade 

Will  echo  on  in  an  undying  strain. 

We  know,  white-souled  and  loyal-hearted  man, 
That  unto  all  who  shall  this  picture  scan, 

Though  it  may  be  far  on  in  distant  days, 
Thy  face  will  be  familiar,  for  the  fame 
Which  now  thy  modest  heart  bids  thee  disclaim 

Will  crown  thy  brow  with  Art's  eternal  bays. 
97 


THERE'S    NOTHING    LIKE    THE 
OLD    BALLADE 

(  DOUBLE     BALLADE ) 

OF  all  the  tangled  tropes  that  tell 
Of  love  or  hate,  or  joy  or  pain, 

In  sonnet,  rondeau,  villanelle, 
Or  ode,  or  epic,  or  quatrain, 
Or  any  other  kind  of  strain, 

Or  light  or  heavy,  gay  or  sad, 
To  bring  a  boon  or  balk  a  bane, 

There  's  nothing  like  the  old  ballade. 

98 


THERE'S   NOTHING    LIKE   THE   OLD    BALLADE 

Its  single  cymbal  suits  me  well, 

But  when  I  sound  the  clanging  twain, 
Then  Pegasus  begins  to  smell 

The  battle,  and  he  shakes  his  mane ; 

No  need  of  spur, —  I  give  him  rein. 
Think  ye  that  he 's  a  patient  pad  ? 

To  make  him  gallop  for  his  grain, 
There 's  nothing  like  the  old  ballade. 


Did  not  rash  Villon  in  his  cell 

Hard  by  the  sobbing  waves  of  Seine, 

Deaf  to  the  dooming,  dismal  bell, 
And  all  unmindful  of  his  chain, 
There  carol  forth  a  rare  refrain 

That  comes  to  us  with  glory  clad  ? 
If  rhyme  could  rid  him  of  his  stain, 

There  's  nothing  like  the  old  ballade. 

99 


THERE'S   NOTHING    LIKE   THE    OLD    BALLADE 

For  from  his  reckless  lips  there  fell 

Such  glowing  gems  that  Glory's  fane, 
Wherein  the  world's  Immortals  dwell, 

Doth  many  a  less  than  he  contain. 

The  prude  may  treat  him  with  disdain, 
She  neither  can  detract  nor  add, 

For  beauty  did  a  champion  gain, — 
There 's  nothing  like  the  old  ballade. 


The  high-born  maiden's  heart  will  swell, 

And  think  the  whispered  vow  inane 
Sweet  as  the  voice  of  philomel, 

When  poesy  hath  made  it  plain. 

See  yonder  awkward,  stammering  swain  ! 
His  simple  song  makes  Chloe  glad ; 

When  tongues  are  tied  and  vows  are  vain, 
There  's  nothing  like  the  old  ballade. 


100 


THERE'S   NOTHING    LIKE    THE    OLD    BALLADE 

The  tune  that  Triton  taught  the  shell, 
Sung  by  the  surge  and  hurricane, 

The  lute  of  Orpheus,  'neath  whose  spell 
We,  like  the  Thracians,  long  have  lain, 
Pan's  pipes  that  filled  the  shepherd's  brain 

With  melody  that  made  him  mad, 

All  live, — so  why  should  Villon  wane? 

There 's  nothing  like  the  old  ballade. 


ENVOY 


Prince  !  though  this  tantalizing  skein 
Of  rhyme  hath  less  of  good  than  bad, 

A  cup  to  Villon  let  us  drain, — 

There  's  nothing  like  the  old  ballade. 


101 


ON    NEW   YEAR'S   EVE 

( RONDEAU ) 

ON  New  Year's  Eve,  long  years  ago, 
Ere  Temple  Bar  was  leveled  low, 

I  strolled  along  the  Strand  and  Fleet, — 
I  mean,  of  course,  the  classic  street, — 
Then  Ludgate  Hill  I  mounted  slow. 

I  paused  in  Paternoster  Row, 
At  Amen  Corner  there, — for  oh  ! 
I  heard  Paul's  bells  a  paean  beat, 

On  New  Year's  Eve. 

Their  music  drowned  the  Bells  of  Bow, 
In  Cheapside  near,  for  such  a  flow 
Of  rhythmic  ringing,  full  and  sweet, 
Did  greet  me  then,  it  still  doth  greet 
Me  through  the  years  where'er  I  go 

On  New  Year's  Eve. 

102 


VIVE   LA   BAGATELLE 

(BALLADE) 

OFTEN  when  I  think 
Of  the  days  gone  by, 

Into  gloom  I  sink, 
And  I  sit  and  sigh, 
Scarcely  knowing  why ; 

Monk  in  lonely  cell 
Happier  is  than  I, — 

Vive  la  bagatelle  I 

Let  the  glasses  clink ! 

Drain  the  beakers  dry ! 
Death  to  sorrow  drink ! 

Life  to  jollity ! 

See  the  shadows  fly  ! 
Better  cap  and  bell, 

Than  in  grief  to  die, — 
Five  la  bagatelle  ! 
103 


VIVE   LA   BAGATELLE 

Ah,  those  cheeks  of  pink  ! 

Little  rogue  so  sly, 
Forging  link  by  link, 

Every  one  a  tie ; 

Lips  that  I  might  try 
Vainly  to  repel, 

Conquer  as  they  cry, 
Vive  la  bagatelle  ! 

ENVOY 

Happy  hearts  that  lie 
Safe  within  love's  spell ; 

Sorrow  may  defy, — 
Vive  la  bagatelle  ! 


104 


BIRTHDAY   SONNET 

WE  cry  when  we  are  born,  but  when  we  die, 
Though  others  there  may  be  who  for  us  weep, 
Yet  do  we  often  welcome  that  last  sleep, 

And  pass  away  from  earth  without  a  sigh. 

But  in  the  intervening  years  that  fly 
Sorrow  and  joy  uncertain  vigils  keep, 

Till  life  itself  seems  naught  but  vanity, 
And  death  the  only  harvest  we  shall  reap. 

As  to  Egyptian  feasts  the  corpse  was  brought, 
To  teach  the  revelers  that  life  was  naught, 

So  may  this  dismal  verse  to  thee  appear ; 
But  not  one  shadow  would  I  cast  this  day, — 
I  wish  thee  all  good  things,  and  with  them  pray 

That  God  will  give  thee  many  a  happy  year. 


105 


THE    DEVOTEE 

THOU  art  no  saint,  but  when  I  feel 

Thy  blessed  lips  on  mine, 
In  adoration  I  could  kneel 

And  own  thee  half  divine. 
A  glory  crowns  thy  golden  hair, 

And  lights  thy  loving  eyes ; 
Daughter  of  earth,  thou  art  as  fair 

As  those  who  tread  the  skies. 

And  when  in  my  enraptured  ears 

Thy  murmuring  accents  flow, 
I  think  some  spirit  of  the  spheres 

Hath  wandered  here  below ; 
For  angel  lips  alone  could  move 

In  melody  so  sweet. 
Child  of  the  skies,  behold  thy  love 

A  suppliant  at  thy  feet. 
1 06 


THE   DEVOTEE 

Time's  rough  unsparing  hand  will  chase 

Thy  loveliness  away ; 
But  there  's  a  nobler,  loftier  grace 

That  triumphs  o'er  decay. 
The  heart  that  never  once  betrayed, 

That  changing  years  have  tried, 
When  all  thy  other  beauties  fade, 

Shall  draw  me  to  thy  side. 


107 


FRANCESCA 

LADY,  thy  melodist,  on  Fancy's  wing, 

Far  through  the  golden-misted  past  doth  stray ; 

Oh,  if  to  crown  thy  beauty  he  could  bring 
The  silver  beam  of  Dante's  deathless  ray, 
That  'round  the  brow  of  Beatrice  doth  play, 

Or  that  which  Petrarch  did  o'er  Laura  fling, — 

Thy  name,  dear  love,  should  down  the  ages  ring, 
Till  earth  and  all  thereon  were  swept  away. 

Fame's  living  leaves  should  be  thine  aureole, 
And  such  a  song  as  shrines  old  Ilium's  curse 

Should  tell  the  years  the  beauty  that  is  thine  ; 
A  hymn  of  homage  down  Time's  tide  to  roll, 
To  bear  thee  onward  in  a  deathless  verse, — 
That  were  thy  guerdon,  if  the  gift  were  mine. 


108 


THROUGH  JOYOUS  YEARS 

THROUGH  joyous  years,  that  ever  show 

Increase  of  gladness  as  they  go, 
May  calm  content  and  happiness, 
And  all  life  holds  to  crown  and  bless, 

Be  what  the  gods  on  thee  bestow. 

May  summer  skies  above  thee  glow, 
And  favoring  breezes  ever  blow, 

Thy  bark  o'er  tranquil  tides  to  press 

Through  joyous  years. 

1  •  - 

And  tears, — if  tears  should  sometimes  flow,- 
May  they  be  April  showers  that  owe 
Their  source  to  joy  and  not  distress ; 
That  vanish  with  the  close  caress 
Of  lips  that  love  and  fonder  grow 

Through  joyous  years. 
109 


ADIEU    D'  AMOUR 

FAITHFUL  in  every  fibre  of  thy  heart, 
And  all  as  beautiful  as  thou  art  true, 

Yet  if  it  be  thy  wish  that  we  should  part, 
Let 's  unkiss  all  our  vows  and  say  Adieu. 

The  love  that  glowed  so  warmly  in  thy  breast 
Is  dying  slowly, — shall  we  let  it  die? 

Yes,  if  the  flickering  flame  brings  thee  unrest, 
My  tears  shall  drown  it  as  I  weep  Good-by. 

Good-by  !    Ah  no  !     We  cannot  break  the  chain  ; 

The  fetters  fused  in  passion's  crucible 
Are  hard  to  sever ;  so  we  must  remain 

Bound  to  each  other,  though  we  sigh  Farewell. 


no 


ENGLAMOURED 

THERE  's  a  love  that  every  other  love  excelleth, 

And  its  glamour  doth  outglow  the  noonday  sun ; 
'T  is  the  faith  that  with  suspicion  never  dwelleth, 

And  the  rapture  that  is  reckless  to  outrun 
The  fond  hope  that  every  compassed  joy  sur 
passes, 

Till  with  eagerness  it  thrilleth  to  embrace. 
They  may  bid  me  look  on  thee  through  Doubt's 
dark  glasses, 

But  I  only  see  the  beauty  of  thy  face. 


in 


I    LOVE   THEE   STILL 

(RONDEAU) 

I  LOVE  thee  still, — there  's  not  a  day 
That  drags  its  dreary  length  away, 
From  dark  December  unto  June, 
Through  winter  night  or  summer  noon, 
But  unto  thee  my  fancies  stray. 

Poor  heralds  of  my  heart  are  they 
Who  would  to  thee  my  love  convey 

And  woo  thee  with  the  wearying  tune, — 

I  love  thee  still. 

Ah,  but  to  feel  thy  pulses  play, 

And  once  again  my  head  to  lay 

On  thy  white  breast !     For  such  a  boon, 
Though  thou  wert  fickle  as  the  moon, 

My  lips  would  cling  to  thee  and  say, — 

I  love  thee  still. 

112 


THE   SUPPLICANT 

IDEAL  beauty  such  as  angels  wear 

Clothes  thee  with  living  glory,  and  I  feel 
An  overpowering  influence  to  kneel 

And  vows  of  love,  eternal  love,  to  swear ; 

Oh  listen,  and  these  supplications  hear ! 

These  sighs  and  tears  which  I  cannot  conceal 
Would  move  a  heart  of  adamantine  steel, 

Or  from  a  silent  sphinx  its  secret  tear. 

Mysterious  power  of  Love  !  lend  me  thine  aid,- 
They  never  call  in  vain  who  cry  to  thee. 

By  that  wild  kiss  which  on  her  lips  I  laid, 
Tumultuous  type  of  richer  rhapsody, 

For  one  short  hour  these  fevered  lips  of  mine 

Steep  in  voluptuous  love's  enchanted  wine. 


THEA 

WHEN  'gainst  the  clamor  of  my  blood  the  wave 
Of  chiding  crimson  rushes  to  thy  face ; 
When  with  insistent  beat  my  pulses  race 

And  mock  the  rebel  blushes  that  would  brave 

And  balk  me  of  the  bliss  for  which  I  crave, — 
Then,  though  thy  lips  may  mutine  for  a  space, 
Soon  in  the  cincture  of  a  close  embrace 

Breathes  the  surrendering  sigh  that  oft  forgave. 

I  dream  of  thee  by  day  and  night ;  the  flame 
Thy  kiss  hath  kindled  in  my  blood  doth  glow 

Like  to  a  ceaseless  and  a  secret  fire 
To  light  me  to  the  hour  when  I  shall  claim 
The  pledge  of  passion  promised  long  ago, — 
The  crowning  of  my  love  and  life's  desire. 


114 


WAIFS 

ONE  morn  with  quickened  pulses  did  we  stand 

Where   life's  young  fountains    murmured  of 
unrest ; 

The  virgin  vintage  of  her  lips  I  pressed, 
And  lo !  we  passed  to  an  enchanted  land, 
Where    Ruin's    bridgeless    gulf   was    rainbow- 
spanned ; 

But  when  that  night  she  wept  upon  my  breast, 
She  seemed  a  love-wrecked  angel  on  the  strand 

Of  some  strange  star,  wing-weary  and  unblest. 

Not  all  unhappy,  still  we  drift  along, 

Down  the  wild  waters  of  Love's  waif-strown  sea; 

And  closer  do  we  cling,  when  others  tell 
Of  that  dark  whirlpool  in  whose  eddies  strong 
Frail  passion-freighted  lovers  such  as  we 
Are  dragged  by  under-currents  down  to  hell. 


RUBRIC 

NOT  as  the  Pharisee  who  stood  apart 

And  thanked  Thee  that  he  was  not  like  the 
rest; 

But  as  the  Publican  who  smote  his  breast 
And  owned  the  sin  that  ruled  his  rebel  heart ; 
So  when  we  err  forgive  us,  for  Thou  art 

Most  merciful  to  those  who  in  love's  quest 
Grow  obdurate,  till  Conscience  hath  no  dart 

That  is  not  dulled  and  ceases  to  molest. 

When  the  warm  warrant  of  the  blood  begins 
To  lend  its  license  to  our  love,  and  we 

Revel  in  all  the  rapturous  joys  that  make 
Us  derelict  to  duty,  may  our  sins 

Be  lighter  held  if  then  we  pray  to  Thee 

That   other  hearts  through  us  may  never 
ache. 

116 


IN   ABSENCE 

I  SIT  with  Pan  beneath  Arcadian  trees 

And  see  the  satyr  and  the  nymph  and  faun ; 

I  look  on  dazzling  Aphrodite  drawn 
By  dolphins  over  shining  sapphire  seas ; 
I  hear  the  tune  of  Triton  in  the  breeze, 

Sad  philomel  at  night,  the  lark  at  dawn, 
But  little  power  have  they  to  appease 

My  passion  and  my  pain  when  thou  art  gone. 

Yea,  e'en  the  paths  of  poesy  seem  bare 
Of  all  their  beauty,  for  I  fail  to  find 

In  them  the  flowers  whose  fragrance  once 

could  fling 
A  spell  around  me  that  defied  despair, 

That  made  me  deaf  to  love,  to  passion  blind, — 
But  little  consolation  now  they  bring. 


117 


LOVE    ME   ONCE    MORE 

LOVE  me  once  more.    Ah,  what  have  I  to  do 
With  love,  or  what  has  love  to  do  with  me  ? 
And  yet  thy  face  by  day  and  night  I  see, 

And  with  this  prayer  my  soul  doth  thine  pursue,- 

Love  me  once  more. 

Love  me  once  more ;  and  it  will  teach  the  pen 
That  pleads  so  feebly  to  thee  on  this  page 
To  tell  lorn  lovers,  in  some  after  age, 

That  love,  though  dead,  may  leap  to  life  again. 

Love  me  once  more ;  for  as  the  hart  doth  pant 
To  drink  the  water-brooks,  I  thirst  for  thee ; 
Here,  in  the  waste  of  life,  I  bend  the  knee 
And  murmur  like  a  famished  mendicant, — 

.  Love  me  once  more. 

118 


LOVE   ME   ONCE   MORE 

Love  me  once  more ;  and  these  poor  rhymes  I 

write 
In  thrilling   trumpet   tones   shall    sound   thy 

name, 

Till  it  shall  echo  where  the  Peaks  of  Fame 
Are  bathed  forever  in  ambrosial  light. 

Love  me  once  more.     Dost  thou  no  longer  heed 
That    which    had  once   been   life's   supremest 

prize  ? 

And  wilt  thou  now  the  proffered  gift  despise 
And  turn  away,  to  mock  me,  as  I  plead, — 

Love  me  once  more  ? 


119 


THE    IDOLATER 

METHINKS  it  is  not  strange  that  I  should  kneel, 

For  'round  thy  head  a  golden  glory  plays ; 
Nor  do  I  wonder  that  my  senses  reel, 

Delirious  with  the  glamour  of  thy  gaze ; 
And  when  thy  rich,  impassioned  lips  I  press, 

Life's  cup  is  full,  and  death  would   be  most 

sweet 
If  I  could  breathe  farewell  in  that  caress 

And  make  thy  snowy  limbs  my  winding-sheet. 

Ah  no,  dear  love,  unless  that  parting  sigh 
Mingles  with  thine,  and  in  one  joyous  flight 

We  voyage  onward  o'er  the  trackless  sky, 
Till  havened  in  some  heaven  of  delight, 

I  'd  rather  linger  with  thee  on  this  sphere, 

For  heaven  is  close  when  thou,  my  love,  art  near. 


1 20 


WHEN    LULU    COMES 

(RONDEAU) 

WHEN  Lulu  comes, — yea,  long  before 
Her  dainty  fingers  beat  my  door, 

Before  her  eager  step  I  hear, 

My  heart  leaps  up  to  greet  my  dear, — 
It  must  be  Love's  unconscious  lore. 

I  live  upon  the  topmost  floor ; 
Yet  never  lark  did  skyward  soar 

With  gladder  heart  than  hers,  I  swear, 
When  Lulu  comes. 

Like  waves  that  beat  a  distant  shore, 
The  crowded  streets  beneath  me  roar. 
What  care  I  for  that  sullen  sphere, 
When  heaven  itself  is  drawing  near  ? 
Its  glowing  gates  I  '11  pass  once  more, 

When  Lulu  comes. 

121 


VICTOR    LOVE 

TENDER,  melting  lips,  distilling 

Love's  rich  vintage,  sweet  and  rare ; 

Trusting,  pleading  eyes,  now  rilling 
With  the  bright  reproachful  tear, 

A  sob  so  sweet,  so  softly  low, 

A  breath  of  heaven,  a  knell  of  woe. 


Ah,  the  murmuring  and  the  sighing, 
And  the  tumult  in  each  breast ! 

Heart  to  heart  is  now  replying, 
Victor  Love  is  crowned  and  blest ; 

The  tyrant  sits  in  Reason's  throne, 

And  claims  the  kingdom  for  his  own. 

122 


VICTOR   LOVE 

How  he  scatters  all  his  treasures 
On  his  subjects,  you  and  me, — 

Golden  showers  of  richest  pleasures  ! 
Godlike  mortals  now  are  we. 

What  care  we  for  the  sword  of  flame 

That  bars  the  gate  through  which  we  came  ! 


What,  beloved,  art  thou  sobbing, 
Weeping  that  there 's  no  return  ? 

How  thy  timid  heart  is  throbbing ! 
How  thy  cheeks  with  crimson  burn  ! 

My  kiss  shall  teach  thee  to  forget, 

And  love  shall  triumph  o'er  regret. 


123 


GOOD-BY,   SWEETHEART 

(RONDEAU) 

GOOD-BY,  sweetheart, — you  made  me  blest, 
But  now  you  leave  me  like  the  rest. 
The  future  seems  a  black  abyss, 
But  o'er  the  gulf  I  waft  a  kiss, 
Which  on  this  parting  page  is  pressed. 

By  others  I  have  been  caressed, 
But  you  I  loved  the  last  and  best, 

Yet  now,  like  them,  you  murmur  this, — 
Good-by,  sweetheart. 

Your  coldness  long  ago  was  guessed, 
Although  it  never  was  confessed ; 
But  I  forgive  you  for  the  bliss 
Of  bygone  days,  which  I  shall  miss 
In  those  to  come, —  but  why  protest? 

Good-by,  sweetheart. 
124 


THE   TEMPTRESS 

BELIKE  thou  art  a  temptress  come  from  hell, — 
The  devil  oft  dons  a  fair  disguise, — 
And  yet  I  like  the  laughter  in  thine  eyes, 

And  for  thy  lips,  I  love  them  wondrous  well ; 

They  do  remind  me  of  an  ocean  shell, 
With  all  its  murmuring  melody  of  sighs, 

Till  I  forget,  when  captive  to  their  spell, 

The  whispered  music  may  be  naught  but  lies. 

Nay,  nay !   I  do  thee  wrong ;   have  I  not  felt 
The  rosy  rebels  into  sweetness  melt, 

And  seen  thee  swoon  beneath  my  warm  caress  ? 
What  matter  if  thy  lips  the  word  withhold, — 
In  the  mute  music  of  thy  pulses  bold 

Thy  love  grows  voluble  and  doth  confess. 


125 


THE    KING    IS    DEAD;     LONG    LIVE 
THE    KING! 

(BALLADE) 

WHEN  Villon  sang  the  melted  snows, 
The  white  shroud  of  a  buried  year, 

Say,  did  the  traitor  winds  disclose 
Their  hiding-place,  or  tell  him  where 
Were  laid  the  dead,  the  debonair 

Lost  women  whom  he  loved  to  sing  ? 

No,  but  they  sighed,  then  answered  clear, — 

The  king  is  dead ;  long  live  the  king ! 

Why  weep  the  love-surrendered  rose  ? 

Is  faded  beauty  worth  a  tear? 
On  yonder  stem  another  glows, 

In  fresher  fragrance  hanging  there ; 
126 


THE   KING   IS   DEAD;    LONG    LIVE    THE    KING 

While  in  the  murmuring  breeze  we  hear 
The  love-song  of  the  joyous  Spring, 

Shouting  above  old  Winter's  bier, 
The  king  is  dead  ;  long  live  the  king  ! 

And  thus  the  cycling  measure  goes ; 

One  day  fond  lips  allegiance  swear, 
The  next  the  wanton  traitress  throws 

Her  eyes  on  some  new  cavalier, 

Who  for  a  season  short  may  wear 
Her  favors,  in  his  turn  to  fling 

Them  to  the  winds  for  one  more  fair, — 
The  king  is  dead ;  long  live  the  king  ! 

ENVOY 

Prince !  when  you  listen  to  the  cheer 

That  through  your  crowded  courts  shall  ring, 

Remember,  thus  they  '11  hail  your  heir — 
The  king  is  dead ;  long  live  the  king  ! 
127 


VACILLATION 

THE  blessing  and  the  curse  alternate  rise ; 
One  day  I  swear  that  thou  art  fairer  far 
Than  the  chaste  beauty  of  yon  silver  star 

That  nightly  hangs  her  lamp  in  western  skies ; 

The  next  I  look  on  thee  with  other  eyes, — 
Thy  beauty  hath  all  vanished,  and  thou  art 
Foul  as  a  leper,  and  thy  traitor  heart 

Seems  but  a  sink  of  craftiness  and  lies. 

One  day  with  many  a  passion-prompted  vow 
I  braid  love's  votive  blossoms  in  thy  hair ; 

The  next  I  tear  the  tribute  from  thy  brow, 
And  crown  thee  with  the  curses  of  despair : 

Swayed  by  the  changing  moon,  tides  ebb  and  flow, 

So  to  thy  fickle  heart  these  moods  I  owe. 


128 


THE   FRIAR'S   CONFESSION 

(BALLADE) 

OF  this  fasting  and  praying  I  'm  weary, 
For  the  flesh  is  rebellious  and  bold ; 

I  have  mumbled  and  said  Ave  Mary, 
Of  my  Paters  a  thousand  I  Ve  told, 
And  in  sackcloth  I  'm  cassocked  and  stoled ; 

I  am  buttressed  with  candle  and  bell, 
Still  a  face  of  the  lost  I  behold, 

For  of  such  is  the  kingdom  of  hell. 

At  the  first  she  seemed  timid  and  chary, 

And  she  blushed  'neath  her  nimbus  of  gold ; 

Then  she  smiled  at  each  sinful  vagary 
That  her  whispering  lips  did  unfold, 
Till  I  thought  of  that  temptress  of  old 

Whom  Saint  Anthony  drove  from  his  cell ; 
But  I  shrived  her  and  soothed  and  consoled, 

For  of  such  is  the  kingdom  of  hell. 
129 


THE   FRIAR'S   CONFESSION 

But  she  left  me  one  day,  and  I  query, 

To  whose  arms  has  the  wanderer  strolled  ? 
Let  Te  Deum,  and  not  Miserere, 

A  loud  song  of  thanksgiving  be  trolled. 

But  perhaps  she  is  under  the  mould, 
And  her  soul  with  the  devil  doth  dwell ; 

Let  Beelzebub  then  be  condoled, 
For  of  such  is  the  kingdom  of  hell. 

ENVOY 

When  the  face  of  a  wanton  's  enrolled 
With  a  halo,  it 's  hard  to  repel ; 

Then  no  wonder  we  're  often  cajoled, 
For  of  such  is  the  kingdom  of  hell. 


130 


THE   MAENAD 

THAT  fiction  in  thy  face  is  not  a  blush, — 

Do  I  not  know  thy  glowing  beauty  well  ? 
'T  is  Passion's  rosy  herald,  as  I  crush 

The  ripe  grapes  of  thy  lips,  and  doth  foretell 
A  richer  vintage  than  did  ever  crown 

Bacchante's  reddest  beaker ;   though  that  flood 
Hath  often  lit  with  laughter  Sorrow's  frown, 

It  never  lent  such  longings  to  my  blood. 

Thy  kisses  shake  my  pulses,  till  my  heart, 
Lured  by  the  murmuring  music  in  thy  veins, 
Panteth  with   Passion's   painless  pangs  for 

thee. 

Who  taught  thy  lips  to  link  with  such  sweet  art 
These  soul-ensnaring  and  flesh-fettering  chains, 
Thy  tongue  this  soft  Circean  sorcery  ? 


THE   WEDDING-BELL 

THIS  day,  long  years  ago,  my  love  and  life 

And  loyalty  were  pledged,  and  as  thy  bride, 
Thy  best  beloved,  thy  chosen  one  and  wife, 
I  heard  these  words,  when  standing  at  thy 

side : — 
"Whom  God    hath  joined,  let  naught  on 

earth  divide." 

With  clean  young  lips  I  gave  thee  vow  for  vow, 

From  thee  no  secret  did  my  heart  then  hide, 

With  faith  and  love  thy  words  did  me  endow, — 

Down  through  the  wasted  years  thy  voice  comes 

ringing  now. 

My  heart  was  pure  as  is  the  crystal  dew 

That  trembles  in  the  lily's  breast  ot  snow; 
But  only  for  a  few  short  months  't  was  true ; 
132 


THE   WEDDING-BELL 

How  few,  'twere  better  for  thee  not  to  know. 
Before  distrust  was  dreamt  of,  years  ago, 
I  gave  myself  to  one  whose  lips  of  fire 

Made  my  young  placid   pulses  throb  and 

glow 

And  leap  beneath  the  lashes  of  desire, 
Till  Innocence  lay  dead  on  Passion's  flaming  pyre. 

They  say  the  first  false  step  is  hard  to  take ! 

To  some,  perhaps,  it  is,  but  unto  me 
It  was  most  easy ;  for  I  did  forsake 

Virtue's  stern  path  as  one  who  turns  to  flee 
From  some  unpleasant  thing ;  I  sought  the 

free, 
Voluptuous  scenes  where  Passion  spreads  her 

flowers, 

Nor  did  I  have  one  weak  regret  for  thee ; 
Eager  I  was  for  Sin's  soft  sensual  hours, 
And  from  thy  side  would  steal  to  those  forbidden 
bowers. 


THE   WEDDING-BELL 

How  many  times  I  Ve  felt  thy  lips  on  mine, 
Joined  in  a  kiss  of  trusting  tenderness  ! 

While  I  would  cling  unto  thee  like  a  vine, 
And  lasting  love  and  loyalty  confess, 
Little  thy  poor  deluded  heart  did  guess 

In  other  arms  that  very  hour  I  'd  lain  : 
Thus  with  my  Judas  lips  and  soft  caress 

Did  I  thy  love  and  confidence  retain, 
While  closer  round  thy  heart  I  forged  the  galling 
chain. 


I  loved  the  guilty  glamour  at  the  first, — 
It  painted  hell  in  most  alluring  dyes ; 

For  Sin's  adulterous  cup  my  soul  did  thirst, — 
With  it  I  swallowed  all  the  flattering  lies 
That  sang  the  praises  of  my  lips  and  eyes, 

And,  like  a  moth,  I  flew  to  meet  the  flame. 
But  soon  I  found  their  hollow  gallantries 


THE   WEDDING-BELL 

Did  always  cloak  and  cover  but  one  aim, — 
In  every  brimming  glass  they  made  me  drink  my 
shame. 

When  first  my  stealthy  steps  began  to  tread 
Sin's  crooked  labyrinth,  I  did  conceal 

Each  guilty  act  with  care  ;  for  I  did  dread 
Thy  watchful  eye,  and  then,  perhaps,  did  feel 
A  little  shame ;   but  now,  with  heart  of  steel 

And  face  of  brass  and  bolder  feet,  I  go 

The  slippery  way;   or,  like  a  drunkard,  reel 

Reckless  and  fearless  of  the  fate  I  know 
That  drags  me  down  and  down  to  one  dark  doom 
of  woe. 

The  beauty  that  thy  lips  once  loved  to  praise 
Withers  so  fast  that  I  can  see  it  fade ; 

And  Lust's  bold  burning  breath  will  soon  erase 
The  little  that  is  left  me  to  degrade. 


THE   WEDDING-BELL 

I  found  it  hard  at  first  in  shame  to  trade, — 
I  gave  them  my  young  soul,  which  they  did 

mould 
Howe'er  they  wished,  the  while  thy  name 

was  made 

A  byword  and  a  sneer ;  now,  bold  and  cold, 
My  meretricious  lips  have  learnt  to  ask  for  gold. 

And  now,  I  am — ah  God  !    I  hate  to  speak 
The  loathsome  word — a  thing  that  knows 
not  where 

Its  proper  place  is.    Sometimes  when  I  seek 
To  gather  from  the  past  some  hope  to  cheer, 
I  think  of  what  I  am,  and  freeze  with  fear ; 

But  in  my  dreams  I  wander  back  again 

To  brighter  scenes,  and  I  behold  thee,  dear, 

As  in  our  love's  young  days.    Alas,  how  vain  ! 
Before  the  breaking  dawn  the  dreamy  vistas  wane. 


136 


THE   WEDDING-BELL 

At  first  a  few  were  good  to  me  and  kind, 

But  all  their  kindness  was  of  no  avail ; 
Bound  up  in  self,  I  was  both  deaf  and  blind, 

The  promises  I  made  were  meant  to  fail. 

'T  is  easy  to  be  false  when  one  is  frail, 
And  I  became  an  adept  to  deceive, 

Till  now  there  is  no  sin  at  which  I  quail, 
Nor  anything  in  life  o'er  which  I  grieve, 
Except,  perhaps,  our  child,  to  whom  I  hope  to 
cleave. 

And  so  they  all  did  go,  till  every  one 

Had  passed  away  from  me,  and  quickly,  too. 

I  saw  old  friends,  with  faces  turned  to  shun, 

Avoid  me  on  the  street ;  for  well  they  knew 

That   I    had  joined    the    black,   abandoned 

crew, 

And  like  a  chattel  could  be  bought  and  sold. 
Did  I  say  all  ?      No ;    one   poor  fool  was 
true, — 


THE   WEDDING-BELL 

One  who  had  loved  me  well  in  days  of  old, — 
But  the  devoted  dupe  could  give  me  little  gold. 

And  now  I  do  not  find  it  very  hard 

To  stalk  my  quarry  on  the  public  street ; 
Practice   hath   skilled   me   well    my  looks    to 

guard, 
And   often  when    some    stranger  comes   to 

greet 

My  actions  are  most  proper  and  discreet. 
My  long-experienced  eyes  have  learnt  to  look 
With    well-schooled  glances,   most  demure 

and  sweet ; 

I  know  the  crafty  lesson  like  a  book, 
And  with  what  charms  are  left  I  bait  the  hidden 
hook. 

Why  enter  into  all  the  ways  and  wiles 

That  women  like  me  use  to  gain  their  ends  ? 

138 


THE   WEDDING-BELL 

The  contemplation  hardly  reconciles 

The  present  with  the  past ;  it  only  blends 
Sorrow  and  sin  together,  and  it  lends 
A  bitterness  that  rankles  in  the  heart. 

Though  I  am  hardened  now  beyond  amends, 
And  all  untouched  by  Shame's  most  poignant 

dart, 

Yet  when  I  think  on  thee  my  soul  with  pain  doth 
smart. 

I  loved  thee  once ;  I  think  I  love  thee  still, 
Though  time  hath  taught  my  hardened  heart 

to  shrink 
From  brooding  o'er  those  days ;  but  Memory 

will 
Call  up  the  tears.    When  now,  too  late,  I 

think 

That    I   gave    thee    life's    bitterest   cup    to 
drink, 


.    THE   WEDDING-BELL 

How  fast  they  rise,  though  no  one  sees  them 

flow! 

And  when  I  kiss  thy  child,  the  one  last  link 
That  binds  me  to  the  past,  too  well  I  know 
That  to  myself  alone  my  misery  I  owe. 

The  breath  of  Spring  once  more  is  in  the  air 
As  on  that  day ;     the  skies  are  clear  and 

bright ; 

I  feel  the  breezes  running  through  my  hair, 
And,  for  a  moment,  gaze  with  aching  sight 
Across  the  years  to  scenes  that  half  invite 
My  wandering  feet  to  struggle  and  return. 

Alas  !  the  vision  passes  as  I  write ; 
'T  were  vain  to  let  my  heart  one  moment  yearn 
In    tenderness    for    thee, — the    suppliant    thou 
wouldst  spurn. 


140 


THE   WEDDING-BELL 

I  once  did  think  that  from  my  murdered  past 

No  spectres  e'er  could  rise  to  bring  me  pain  ; 

But  now  they  throng  around  me  thick  and  fast, 

Beating  with  unseen   wings    my   throbbing 

brain. 

Once  more  I  stand  by  thee,  and  once  again 
With  perjured  lips  my  marriage  vows  I  tell, — 
God  !      What  is  this  ?        Have   I   become 

insane  ? 

No  !  no  !     And  yet  I  hear  my  wedding-bell 
Striking  across  the  years, —  Hope's  fateful,  final 
knell. 


141 


A   WHITED   SEPULCHRE 

A  FACE  most  fair  and  aureoled  above 
With  such  a  golden  glory,  it  doth  seem 
A  garland  woven  in  a  poet's  dream 

To  bind  the  brows  of  Innocence  and  Love ; 

Eyes  with  the  trusting  fondness  of  the  dove, 
And  lips,  so  sweetly  parted,  they  appear 
To  breathe  the  heart's  pure  orisons  sincere, 

Or  with  Truth's  tender  vows  alone  to  move. 

Ah,  whited  charnel !  where  the  roses  bloom, 
Only  to  hide  the  horrors  of  the  tomb, 

Thy  ghastly  foulness  thou  canst  not  disguise. 
Those  facile  lips  are  skilled  in  every  art, 
The  ready  servants  of  a  venal  heart, 

While  serpents  lurk  within  the  dove-like  eyes, 

142 


HEAVEN   AND   HELL 

IF   within   those  pearly   portals  where   the  just 

made  perfect  sing 
Endless  songs   and   hallelujahs  in  the  presence 

of  the  King ; 

Where  the   Church  Triumphant  triumphs  over 

all  the  things  of  earth, 
Where  they  know  the  full  fruition  of  their  mystic 

second  birth ; 


Born  of  water  and  the   Spirit,  into  glory,  into 

light, 
Sunshine  ever,  darkness  never,  clothed  in  robes 

of  spotless  white  ; 


HEAVEN   AND   HELL 

Where    through  all   the   courts  of  heaven    ring 

hosannas  to  the  Lamb, 
Where  they  glorify  the  Father,  He,  the  One,  the 

Great  I  AM, 

If,  ye  beatific  spirits  ever  circling  'round  the 
throne, 

Ye  are  happy,  still  remain  so,  Earth  hath  pleas 
ures  of  her  own. 

Flesh  and  blood  cannot  inherit  those  eternal  halls 

of  light, 
Though  at  times  the  baffled  spirit  tries  to  reach 

them  in  its  flight. 

Far  above  the  clouds  it  rises  on  some  heaven- 
storming  strain, 

But  the  weight  of  clay  it  carries  drags  it  down  to 
earth  again ; 

144 


HEAVEN   AND    HELL 

Or,  perhaps,  when  hearts  are  beating  and  when 
tender  lips  are  pressed 

To  our  own  in  love's  rare  moments,  then,  caress 
ing  and  caressed, 

Little   care  we  for  the  raptures  that    the  sons 

of  God  may  know, — 
Earth  hath  daughters  still  as  fair  as  when  they 

knew  them  long  ago. 

Where  the  gnawing  worm  ne'er  dieth,  and  the  cry 

of  torture  rolls, 
Where   the  smoke   through   hell's   hot   hatches 

riseth  up  from  burning  souls, 

Where  old   Dives,  in  his  torment,  heavenward 

rolls  his  pleading  eyes, 
Clutching  with  his  shriveled  fingers  at  the  dear 

and  distant  skies, 

MS 


HEAVEN   AND   HELL 

Sees    the  cool  and  crystal  river  where  the  lazy 

Lazarus  laves 
His  polluted  limbs,  and  mocks  him  in  his  anguish 

as  he  raves, 

Begging  for  one  drop  of  water,  but  one  drop,  to 

cool  his  tongue, 
Though  from  off  the  leper's  finger  even  that  one 

drop  were  flung; 

Where  forever  dwell  the  millions  who  preferred 

the  primrose  way, 
Where  they  reap  hell's  hottest  whirlwind  and  the 

price  of  evil  pay ; 

If,  my  brothers  in  the    brimstone,  recollections 

with  ye  dwell 
Of  your  earthly  days,  remember  earth  itself  can 

turn  to  hell. 

146 


HEAVEN   AND   HELL 

Go  and  ask  that  ghastly  sleeper  stretched  upon 

the  public  slab, 
When  he  sought  the  quick  quietus,  whether  swift 

self-given  stab, 

Boring  bullet,  gas,  or  poison,  hell  itself,  he  did  not 

crave, 
As  his  haunted,  hunted  spirit  glared  across  the 

Stygian  wave. 

Go  and  conjure  back  the  breath  to  its  abandoned 

home  of  clay, 
Then  bend  over  his  pale  lips  and  listen  well  to 

what  they  say : — 

"  Bankrupt   purse    and    tortured    body,    broken 

heart  and  burning  brain, 
Fed  upon  me  at  the  last  as  vultures  feed  upon 

the  slain ; 


HEAVEN   AND   HELL 

"  And  with  hungry  beak  and  talon  did  they  at 

this  carcase  tear, 
But  they  fled  their  breathing  banquet  when  the 

pistol-shot  rang  clear. 

"Youth  and  health,  and  wealth  and  station,  all 
the  world  could  give,  was  mine, — 

Though  the  dregs  were  black  and  bitter,  yet  the 
draught  was  half  divine. 

"  Once  I  thought  the  light  of  heaven  shone  within 

a  woman's  eyes, 
But  Delilah  ne'er  more  deftly  did  her  treachery 

disguise. 

"  All  unconscious  of  disaster  did  I   clasp  unto 

my  heart 
One  whose  Judas  lips  did  ever  with  betraying 

kisses  part, — 

148 


HEAVEN   AND    HELL 

"  One  whose  harlot-hearted  homage  covered  all 

her  crafty  ways. 
Till    helFs    torturing  torch  was  kindled  and  on 

earth  began  to  blaze. 

"In  its  lurid  light  I  saw  her,  and,  by  righteous 

vengeance  swayed, 
First  I  thought  to  slay  the  slayer  of  the  life  she 

had  betrayed ; 

"  But  a  coward  kindness  showing,  let  her  as  the 

wronged  appear, 
Till    her    perjured    plea,    ( desertion/    caught   a 

judge's  willing  ear; 

cc  Then  the  court-created  strumpet,  licensed  with 

her  false  decree, 
Took  my  child,  and  took  my  name,  and  left  me 

blasted,  wrecked,  and  free. 
149 


HEAVEN   AND   HELL 

"  Those   that   had  to  me   been   silent  then  the 

galling  story  told, 
How,  when  honored  and  beloved  and  trusted  in 

the  days  of  old, 

"  Had  her  stealthy  footsteps  wandered  from  me 

at  the  very  first, 
How  her  red,  adulterous  lips  had  always  known 

the  guilty  thirst. 

"Maddened  with  the  revelation,  quick  a  bullet 

crashed  its  way 
Through  my  frenzied  brain,  and  left  me  as  you 

find  me  here  to-day." 

Go  and  give  him  comfort,  Dives ;  thou  art  not 

alone  accurst; 
Thou  but  cravest  drops  of  water, — he,  methinks, 

a  hotter  thirst ; 


HEAVEN   AND   HELL 


Ask  him,  as  the  flaming  torments  'round  about 

ye  leap  and  blaze, 
Whether  hell's  most  cruel  tortures  equal  his  last 

earthly  days. 


A   SKETCH 

VIRTUE  and  truth  were  thine  long,  long  ago, 

But  from  the  first  thy  girlish  steps  did  walk ; 
The  last,  they  say,  who  saw  thee  upward  grow, 

Fled  when  thy  lisping  lips  began  to  talk. 
And  thou  wert  wondrous  fair,  as  many  know, 

But  now,  though  plastered  paint  and  powdered 

chalk 
Strive  hard  to  hide  the  footprints  of  the  crow, 

Time  is  one  suitor  whom  thou  canst  not  mock. 

Yea,  thou  didst  triumph  once,  and  rigid  dames 
With  plainer  features,  but  with  cleaner  names, 

Hated  the  baleful  beauty  of  thy  face. 
Now  in  the  limbo  of  a  hell  whose  blaze 
Leaps  to  enfold  thee,  thou  wouldst  mend  thy 

ways 

And  try  thy  zigzag  footsteps  to  retrace. 
'52 


A   CAROL   OF   THE   CURSED 

To  THAT  sad  second  circle,  where  the  gale 
Whirls  like  dead  leaves  the  souls  of  those  who  wail 
O'er  bygone  earthly  bliss ;  where,  thick  as  dust, 
The  blast  is  peopled  with  the  hosts  of  Lust, 
One  night  I  wandered,  in  a  dream,  and  there 
Looked  on  the  loved  and  lost  ones  of  Despair. 
I  saw  the  Mantuan  with  the  Tuscan  stand, 
And  with  them  for  a  space  the  scene  I  scanned. 
Beauty  and  Anguish  freighted  full  the  blast 
As  Earth's  immortal  lemans  drifted  past. 
All  who  e'er  loved  to  hear  the  serpent's  hiss, 
From  that  great  carnal  queen,  Semiramis, 
Down  to  the  comely  and  complying  maid 
Who    to    her    lover's    arms    steals    through    the 

shade, — 

All  who  have  fed  their  flesh  to  Passion's  fire 
Here  moan  forever  in  a  mournful  choir. 


A   CAROL   OF   THE   CURSED 

First,   Helen,  whose  white   flesh   bore   many  a 

mark 
Branded    by   burning   lips,    swept    through    the 

dark; 
Then,  following,   came    Egypta's   black-browed 

queen, 

Within  whose  glowing  orbs  a  light  was  seen 
That  scorched  a  soul  still  hungry  with  desire ; 
Then  Dido  passed,  who  died  upon  the  pyre ; 
Francesca  wept  and  told  her  tale  again, 
Then  sought  Paolo  in  the  ghostly  train ; 
Delilah,  Messalina,  Jezebel, 
With  myriads  made  the  circling  course  of  hell. 
The  cloudy  cortege  as  it  passed  displayed 
Full  many  a  fair  and  well-remembered  shade ; 
When  lo  !  I  saw  amid  the  tearful  throng 
One  that  did  unto  youth's  fair  days  belong, 
One  I  had  deemed  unspotted  of  the  world, 
Along  the  winds  of  hell  came  swiftly  hurled. 


A   CAROL   OF   THE   CURSED 

She  paused,  divining  well  what  I  would  ask, 
And  said  :  "  I  know  thy  wish  ;  shall  I  unmask 
The  secret  of  my  life  and  tell  thee  how 
I  came  to  be  what  thou  beholdest  now  ? 
Shall  Memory,  mocking  Misery,  uplift 
The  curtain  of  the  past  ?     Shall  Sorrow  shift 
The  far-off  sunny  scenes  of  girlhood  till 
I  show  where  first  I  trembled  to  the  thrill 
Of  Passion's  conquering  kiss  ?     Shall  these  pale 
lips, 

Now  parched  and  withered  in  this  bitter  gust, 
Boast  of  a  beauty  that  ne'er  knew  eclipse, 

Until,  at  last,  it  shuddered  into  dust  ? " 

«  Yea,  tell  me  all,"  I  cried.     She  said :  "Though 

years 
Have  passed  since  I  beheld  thee,  though  thine 

ears 
Heard  nothing  of  me,  in  another  name, 


A   CAROL   OF   THE    CURSED 

In  distant  lands,  my  face  the  creed  became 
Of  men  who  kneel  to  beauty.    Soon  I  rose 
High  in  a  world  where  rank  a  glamour  throws 
Full  oft  around  the  Paphian,  and  I  found 
Myself  a  queen,  unrivaled,  myrtle-crowned. 
I  scaled  the  glittering  heights  of  sin,  where  shame 
Was  soon  forgotten  in  the  flush  of  fame ; 
Yet  often  unto  thee  my  thoughts  would  turn, 
For  't  was  thy  kiss  first  made  my  blood  to  burn 
In  crimson  mutiny,  and  in  my  breast 
Waked  the  persistent  demon  of  unrest. 
Like  flame  on  flax,  thy  lips  on  mine  did  lay 
The  red  coals  of  desire.     One  Christmas  day, 
Within  home's  hallowed  circle,  long  ago, 
Lust  leaped  and  claimed  me  'neath  the  mistletoe, 
And  turned  my  blood  to  a  tumultuous  tide 
That  bore  me  on  and  on  until  I  died. 
Though  in  my  sequent  sin  thou  hadst  no  part, 
Yet  thy  bold  lips  awakened  in  my  heart 

156 


A   CAROL   OF   THE   CURSED 

A  hope  of  happiness  that  never  bloomed, 
But    brought    me    here    among    the    deathless 
doomed." 

't  •<:••.  •--••  '.«( 

She  sighed,  "  Farewell ! "  then,  borne  upon  the 

wind, 

Swept  through  the  doleful  deeps  of  hell  to  find 
Some  lover  she  had  known  on  earth,  with  whom 
To  voyage  for  a  season  through  the  gloom. 


THE   VAMPIRE 

ANGEL  or  demon,  tell  me  which  thou  art, 

And  whither  thou  wouldst   bear  my  captive 
soul, — 

If  far  beyond  the  stars  that  o'er  us  roll, 
To  some  bright  sphere  where  we  shall  never  part, 
Or  to  those  regions  of  eternal  flame, 

Where  spirits  lost  forever  loudly  wail. 
So  thou  art  there,  dear  love,  't  will  be  the  same  ; 

Or  heaven  or  hell  with  thee  I  '11  gladly  hail. 

Body  and  soul  now  thine,  and  thine  alone, 
And  the  rash  homage  of  each  pulsing  vein, 

As  frenzied  love  leaps  into  Reason's  throne, 
And  like  a  drunken  prodigal  doth  reign, — 

All,  all  confess  the  raptures  that  I  feel, 

As  through  thy  lips  my  swooning  senses  steal. 

158 


IT'S  NOT  THE  DISTANCE,  IT 'S  THE 
PACE,   THAT   KILLS 

(DOUBLE  BALLADE) 

WHENAS,  in  summer,  Sophonisba  goes, 
In  fine  foulard,  adown  the  promenade, — 

Or  when,  in  furs,  she  faces  winter  snows, 
In  sumptuous  sables  gorgeously  arrayed, — 
I  wonder  how  the  rosy  rustic  maid 

That  milked  the  cows  with  simple  Jacks  and  Jills 
Into  the  Babylonian  labyrinth  strayed, — 

It 's  not  the  distance,  it 's  the  pace,  that  kills. 

For  her  the  lowing  herd  no  longer  lows, 

No  more  she  drives  it  homeward  through  the 
shade ; 

The  husky  hoeman  pauses  as  he  hoes 

To  wonder  why  she  wandered  from  the  glade. 


IT'  S   THE   PACE   THAT  KILLS 

Not  overmuch  she  loved  him  and  his  spade, 
So  turned  her  from  the  glebe  the  yokel  tills 

And  sought  the  city  and  an  easy  trade, — 
It 's  not  the  distance,  it's  the  pace,  that  kills. 

Fair  is  she  as  the  fabled  queen  that  rose 

From  out  the  rippling  waves  that  'round  her 

played, 

Or  she  who  made  the  Greek  and  Trojan  foes, 
And  watched  them  battle  from  the  barricade 
Through   which    the   wooden    war-horse    was 

conveyed 

That  brought  about  old  Ilium's  endless  ills. 
'Twere    better    she    and    Helen   home   had 

stayed, — 
It 's  not  the  distance,  it 's  the  pace,  that  kills. 

As  yet  her  sky  is  overarched  with  bows, 

Naught  in  the  balance  of  her  brain  is  weighed  ; 
160 


IT'S   THE   PACE   THAT  KILLS 

Little  cares  she  for  Fate's  hard-handed  blows, 
And  nothing  for  the  hair-suspended  blade. 
The  distant  whirling  blast — in  which  is  swayed 

The  reaping-hook  of  Fate — no  warning  shrills  ; 
Such  far  forebodings  rarely  are  obeyed, — 

It's  not  the  distance,  it's  the  pace,  that  kills. 

Mayhap  the  radiant  loveliness  that  glows 

Upon  her  cheek  will  not  too  quickly  fade ; 
I  Ve  sometimes  seen  it  linger  long  with  those 

Who  foot  it  fleetest  down  the  fatal  grade. 

I  mean  not  now  your  ancient  withered  jade, 
Whose  fissured  features  art  inaptly  fills ; 

She  trots  for  years  the  tempting  turf,  afraid, — 
It 's  not  the  distance,  it 's  the  pace,  that  kills. 

Where  to  the  passing  zephyr  Pleasure  sows 

The  seeds  that  Sorrow  reaps  without  her  aid ; 
Where  many  a  fizzing  flagon  upward  throws 

161 


IT'S   THE   PACE   THAT   KILLS 

The  sparkling  bubbles  till  the  roof  is  sprayed ; 

Where  Folly  runs  her  maddest  escapade, 
And  most  unholy  passion  throbs  and  thrills. 

There  laughs  and  loves  the  rustic  renegade, — 
It 's  not  the  distance,  it 's  the  pace,  that  kills. 

ENVOY 

Some  morning  in  the  morgue  we  '11  see  her  laid, 
Silent  within  the  cold  caress  that  stills, 

That  comes  the  rosiest  revel  to  upbraid, — 
It  *s  not  the  distance,  it 's  the  pace,  that  kills. 


162 


MEDUSA 

BOUND  fast  in  tangled  threads  of  golden  hair, 
Drunk  with  the  fiery  vintage  of  her  kiss, 
I  drained  a  draught  of  death  and  thought  it 
bliss, 

And  all  unheeding  slept  for  many  a  year, 

A  willing  captive  in  a  silken  snare. 

And  has  that  heaven  turned  to  hell  like  this  ? 
For  now  I  hear  the  coiling  serpents  hiss, 

And  in  her  eyes  behold  a  threatening  glare. 

I  shudder  as  each  lock  of  shining  gold 

Changes  to  hideous  life,  and  'round  me  flings 
Its  stifling  circles,  winding  fold  on  fold, 

While    in    mine    ears    her   mocking   laughter 

rings ; 

I  feel  her  freezing  breath  and  viper  fangs, 
For  each  forgotten  kiss  a  thousand  pangs. 

163 


THE   UNKNOWN    LOVE 

As  IN  the  City  of  the  Violet  Crown 

An  altar  to  the  Unknown  God  was  raised 
Midst  shrines  of  beauty  that  a  world  amazed, 

And  even  now  in  crumbling  grandeur  frown ; 

For  well  the  fine  Hellenic  hand  could  gown 
The    stone  with   glory ;    but   while    strangers 

praised 

The    peerless    piles,  the    Greek    upon    them 
gazed 

Unmoved  by  all  their  beauty  and  renown. 

For  every  sense  was  sated,  and  he  yearned 
For  more  than  soulless  marble  could  contain, 

Then  did  his  vague  idolatry  disown. 
So  I  on  Passion's  altars  long  have  burned 
The  incense  of  my  soul ;  but  all  in  vain, — 
The  love  I  dream  of  I  have  never  known. 
164 


LONE    MOUNTAIN 

THOU  cross-crowned  hill,  to  which  I  often  turn, 
Although  no  dead  of  mine  lie  slumbering  there, 

I  watch  the  western  skies  behind  thee  burn, 
And  my  pale  lips  are  parted  with  a  prayer, 
Till  resignation  drives  away  despair. 

With  tear-dimmed  eyes  I  gaze  and  can  discern 

The  silent  resting-place  for  which  I  yearn, 
And  unto  which  with  faltering  feet  I  fare. 

When  I  shall  rest  beneath  thee  evermore, 

And  cold,  gray  fogs  drift  o'er  me  from  the  deep, 
Perchance — who  knows? — the  voices  of  the 

sea, 

Rolling  in  deep-toned  music  from  the  shore, 
May  not  be  all  unheard  in  that  last  sleep, 
Murmuring  a  long,  low  slumber-song  to  me. 


165 


WEARY 

NOT  as  a  means  of  grace, 

And  hope  of  glory, — no  ! 
But  could  I  see  Thy  face, 

And  hear  the  blessing  flow, 
As  when  Thy  living  lips  the  promise  poured, 
Then  would  I  kneel  and  wait  for  mercy,  Lord. 

Ye  weary,  come  to  Me 

And  I  will  give  you  rest. 
Have  I  not  bent  the  knee 

And  all  my  soul  confessed  ? 
Art  Thou  a  myth,  O  God  ?  or  am  I  blind, 
Groping  in  gloom  for  peace  I  cannot  find  ? 


166 


WEARY 

Oh,  shed  one  beam  of  light, 

And  when  my  flesh  is  wrung 
Through  agony's  long  night, 

When  all  my  life  is  hung 
On  Retrospection's  cross,  and  when  the  spear 
Of  Conscience  strikes  my  soul,  then  be  Thou  near. 

Whisper  one  word  of  hope, 

That  my  faint  heart  may  know 
How  with  these  fears  to  cope, 
And  respite  gain  from  woe. 

Bind  up  my  wounds  and  breathe  the  healing  balm 
Of  one  kind  word  to  comfort  and  to  calm. 

Not  for  a  heaven  unearned, 

Nor  to  escape  a  hell, 
My  lips  have  often  burned 

To  drink  of  Mercy's  well ; 
Yearning  in  that  sweet  flood  themselves  to  steep, 

And  drift  away  from  life  in  dreamless  sleep. 

167 


PAIN 

Now  IF  this  ink  were  blood,  this  pen  a  quill 

Torn  from  some  fierce  and  flesh-fed  vulture's 

wing, 
This  sheet  a  shroud,  and  mine  such  matchless  skill 

As  his  who  o'er  the  deathless  damned  did  fling 
A  glory  that  the  ages  cannot  pale, — 

Yea,  were  these  mine,  it  might  not  then  be  vain 
To  'prison  on  this  page  an  anguished  wail 

Or  torture-telling  threnody  of  pain. 

But  my  sore,  songless  heart  doth  only  groan 
Low  grief-ground  curses  through  my  gnashing 

teeth. 

Familiar  fiend  of  hell !   wherein  have  I 
Sinned  more  than  others,  that  thou  dost  bequeath 
To  me  an  agony  that  could  atone 

For  half  a  world  and  its  salvation  buy  ? 
168 


ASHES 

* 

To  BE  carnally-minded  is  death 

To  the  spirit  as  well  as  the  clay. 
Like  a  black,  blighting  frost  is  the  breath 

Of  the  lusts  that  we  love  to  obey ; 

How  they  lure  us  and  lead  us  astray ! 
How  they  battle  for  body  and  soul ! 

How  they  riot  by  night  and  by  day, 
And  our  passionate  pulses  control ! 

When  the  lights  and  the  laughter  and  song, 

And  the  wine  and  the  women  of  lust 
Teach  the  blood  of  our  boyhood  to  long, 

Do  we  dream  of  the  wild  whirling  gust  ? 

Do  we  think  that  Life's  apples  are  dust  ? 
Do  we  dread  the  dark  dregs  in  the  wine  ? 

No  !  we  barter  Life's  bread  for  a  crust 
And  a  draught  that  is  bitter  as  brine. 
169 


ASHES 

Recollection  may  call  up  the  past, 
That  comfortless  mocker  of  ill, 

But  it  fades  in  the  withering  blast 

Of  the  whirlwind's  heart-harrowing  chill, 
For  this,  oh  for  this,  do  we  till 

And  bury  the  soul  in  the  soil 

Of  a  past  that  the  present  doth  kill, 

Of  a  future  from  which  we  recoil ! 


Though  the  flesh  may  be  fed  to  the  fire 

Until  nothing  but  ashes  remain, 
Yet  the  smouldering  coals  of  desire, 

Still  lingering,  live  in  the  brain. 

When  the  senses  are  silent  or  slain, 
By  Remembrance  they  're  often  cajoled,- 

Poor  Fancy,  that  forges  a  chain 
Whose  links  but  a  skeleton  hold ! 


170 


ASHES 

Can  the  lips  that  with  eagerness  drain 

The  lust-leavened  cup  to  the  lees, — 
Can  the  soul  with  a  sensual  stain 

Ever  know  the  redemption  that  frees  ? 

Can  Passion's  extortionate  fees, 
By  the  flesh-fettered  profligate  paid, 

The  soul  in  its  sorrowing  ease, 
Or  the  body  in  agony  aid  ? 


171 


COMPENSATION 

YEA,  though  these  trembling  limbs  should  cease 

to  bear 

The  drooping  body  that  they  now  uphold ; 
Though  life's  faint  flame  should  flicker  many  a 

year, 
And    keep    this    breathing   corpse    above    the 

mould ; 
Though  I  should  be  of  everything  bereft, 

By  friends  forsaken,  helpless  and  forlorn, 
Methinks  as  long  as  life  itself  were  left 

All  things  but  one  could  patiently  be  borne. 

• 

I  would  not  bid  the  lurking  Spoiler  stay 
His  lifted  hand  if  I  should  live  to  see 
Thy  face  at  last  in  coldness  turn  away, 

Thy  dear  familiar  lips  grow  strange  to  me ; 
For  when  with  tender  touch  my  own  they  greet 
Pain  is  not  pain,  and  sorrow  is  most  sweet. 

172 


TEARS 

COULD  I  but  crystallize  these  midnight  tears 
And  gather  from  their  beaded  bitterness 
A  rosary  for  burning  lips  to  press, 

Some  pain-born  token  of  these  joyless  years 

To    teach    the    faith    that   saves,   the  hope   that 

cheers ; 

Then  would  I  bid  these  fountains  of  distress 
Flow  fast  and  free,  if  their  sad  floods  could 
bless 

Or  murmur  peace  in  some  poor  sufferer's  ears. 

Have  I  not  known,  O  God !  have  I  not  felt 
The  benediction  of  another's  verse 

Steal  o'er  me  in  the  dark  and  lonely  hour? 
Hath  it  not  made  my  stubborn  heart  to  melt, 
And  turned  to  prayer  the  deep  rebellious  curse, 
And  soothed  my  soul  to  rest  with  wondrous 
power  ? 


ATAXIA 

MY  world  has  shrunk  at  last  to  this  small  room, 

Where  like  a  prisoner  I  must  now  remain ; 
I  'd  rather  be  a  captive  in  the  gloom 

Of  some  damp  dungeon,  tearing  at  my  chain, 
For  then,  perchance,  my  freedom    I  might 

gain. 

Ah  God !  to  think  that  I  must  languish  here, 
Fettered  by  sickness  and  subdued  by  pain, 
To  die  a  living  death  from  year  to  year, 
Joy  banished  from  my  breast  and  Sorrow  brood 
ing  there ! 

Yet  these  familiar  walls  do  sometimes  fade, — 
Then  my  faint  eyes  on  fair  horizons  rest ; 

By  Memory's  distant  lights  I  am  betrayed, 
And  Hope  a  moment  flutters  in  my  breast, 
Till  I  forget  that  I  am  all  unblest. 


ATAX1A 

My  vagrant  fancies  wander  far  away, 

Fond  faces  hover  near,  dear  lips  are  pressed, 
My  stagnant  pulses  seem  to  leap  and  play 
Anew  with  youth's  wild  heat  and  half  revive  this 
clay. 


I  often  think  how  once  these  stumbling  feet, 

That  now  can  scarcely  bear  me  to  my  bed, 
Were  swift  to  follow,  as  the  wind  is  fleet, 
The  baleful  beam  that  to  destruction  led ; 
Nor  paused  I  till  the  luring  light  had  fled, — 
Till  on  mine  ears  there  broke  the  dismal  roar 
Of  that  black  stream  whose  waters  wail  the 

dead ; 
Dumb   with   despair   I    stood,  and   from    that 

shore 

Saw  Charon's  spectre  craft  and  heard  his  doleful 
oar. 


ATAXIA 

Thou  domineering  power  !  or  love,  or  lust, 

Or  passion,  or  whatever  else  thou  art, 
How  have  thy  crimson  roses  turned  to  dust 
And  strown  their  withered  leaves  upon  this 

heart ! 
Though  through  my  vitals  now  thy  venomed 

dart 
Strikes  like  an  adder's  sting,  yet  still  I  feel 

From  Egypt's  fleshpots  it  is  hard  to  part ; 
And  my  weak,  wandering  glances  often  steal 
Back  to  sweet  sinful  things,  until  my  senses  reel. 

Sometimes  at  night  around  my  bed  there  rise 
Fair,  faithless  loves  who  in  the  past  were 

known ; 

But  now  I  look  on  them  with  other  eyes, 
The  wanton  witches  I  no  longer  own ; 
They  come  to  mock  me  as   they  hear  me 
moan, 

And  float  a  cloud  of  taunting  witnesses. 
176 


ATAXIA 

Yet  were  there  some,  whose  arms  around  me 

thrown 

As  in  the  olden  days,  with  soft  caress, 
Could  make  me  half  forget  these  hours  of  sharp 
distress. 

I  do  remind  me  now  of  one  whose  heart 

Hath  leaped  against  mine  own  a  thousand 

times, 

And  though  we  did  not  find  it  hard  to  part, 
And  years  have  passed,  and  now  in  different 

climes 
Our    lives    asunder   lie;    yet   could   these 

rhymes 

Bring  back  that  leman  and  those  long-lost  days, 
I  'd  make  their  strains  ascend  where  angel 

chimes 

Ring  forth  glad  paeans  of  eternal  praise, 
And   from    the    dead,  cold  past  that  matchless 

minion  raise. 

177 


ATAXIA 

Had  Time  but  halted  for  us,  as  the  sun 

Stood  still  on  Gibeon  while  Joshua  strove ! 
Ah  no ;  the  silver  moon  of  Ajalon 

Would  have  looked  kindlier  on  those  nights 

of  love ! 

Little  cared  we  for  sun  or  moon  above, 
Or  for  the  gems  upon  the  black-browed  night ; 
We    may    have     seen    them  through    the 

heavens  move, 
But  recked  not,  thought  not  of  their  wheeling 

flight, 

Blinded,  poor  love-sick  fools !  by  Passion's  daz 
zling  light. 

Oft  in  that  light's  fast-fading  afterglow 
Her  visioned  presence  unto  me  appears ; 

And  as  I  first  beheld  her  long  ago, 

The  same  alluring  loveliness  she  wears. 

Oft  in  the  midnight  silence  fancy  hears 

178 


ATAXIA 

A  sweeter   plaint   than    Pandion's   daughter's 

strain, 

Murmur  in  kisses  that  beguile  my  fears, 
While  in  my  dreams  I  clasp  her  form  again, 
To  wake,  alas !  and  weep  to  find  the  vision  vain. 


She  was  but  one  of  an  ungodly  throng 

Whose  name  was  legion  ;  but  among  them  all 
To  her  my  best  and  brightest  years  belong. 
Though  there  were  others  whom  I  oft  recall, 
Who  wove  their  shining  threads  through  this 

dark  pall 

Long  years  ago  in  Passion's  panting  loom, 
Before  Life's   honeyed  cup   had  turned  to 

gall, 

Or  yet  the  day  had  deepened  to  the  gloom 
That  wraps  me  like  a  shroud  within  this  living 
tomb. 

179 


ATAXIA 

O  Marah  !  Marah  !   as  thy  bitter  stream 

Was  turned  to  sweetness  by  the  magic  tree, 
So  the  dark  current  of  my  years  doth  seem 
To  flow  at  times  in  murmuring  melody. 
'Tis  when,   dear    Lyric    Maid,    I    turn    to 

thee, — 

Then  the  light  laughing  loves  of  other  days 
Hide  their  false  faces  or  like  shadows  flee. 
Oft  had  I  fallen  in  these  cheerless  ways, 
But  heard  the  whispered  words  that  comfort  and 
upraise. 

Now  though  these  limbs  are  cold  and  almost 

dead 
And    torture  runs    through   every   sluggish 

vein, 

Yet  is  endurance  out  of  suffering  bred 
And  fortitude  to  triumph  over  pain. 
The  wasted  body  shrinks,  but  still  the  brain 
180 


ATAXIA 

Urges  the  palsied  hand  along  the  sheet, 

On  which,  alas !  tears  often  fall  like  rain ; 
But  Fancy  even  Misery  can  cheat, 
And  in  the  pain-born  rhyme  will  find  a  refuge 
sweet. 

But  even  there  the  Spoiler  with  his  scythe 
Torments    the   withered   sheaf  he  waits  to 

reap; 

His  torturing  reminders  make  me  writhe, 
Till,  mad  with  pain,  I  beg  the  final  sweep 
That   surely  soon  must  come    to  give  me 

sleep. 

Still  one  retreat  is  left,  to  which  I  flee, — 
Dear    dreamy    draught,    in    which    I    often 

steep 

Body  and  soul !  I  turn  again  to  thee, 
And  drift  down  Lethe's  stream  out  on  Oblivion's 
sea. 

181 


CONSOLATION 

A  SOB  of  sorrow  sounding  through  the  strings 

As  Recollection  ponders  on  the  past, — 
Is  this  the  only  solace  Memory  brings 

To  soothe  a  soul  that  shivers  in  the  blast  ? 

How  soon  the  feast  was  followed  by  the  fast ! 
How  quick  the  fruits  and  flowers  turned  to  dust ! 

How  swift  the  waters  sped  on  which  I  cast 
The  bread  of  life,  that  cometh  back  a  crust ! 

A  crust !     Ah  no  !  though  barren  is  the  shore 
Of  Life's  once  tempting  tide, — whose  waters 

hold 
The  dreams  of  youth  that  in  their  depths 

were  drowned, — 

Not  fruitless  is  the  flood ;  its  waves  restore 
What  Folly  flung  to  them  a  thousand-fold 
When  on  the  strand  some  pearl  of  song  is 

found. 

182 


OUT   OF   EGYPT 

HOPE  of  the  helpless  !     Comforter  of  those 

Whose  world  is  walled  within  the  sick  man's 
room ! 

Lord  God  of  Love  and  Mercy  !  unto  whom 
Pale  prisoners  of  pain  come  with  their  woes ; 
I  thank  Thee  for  the  cheering  light  that  throws 

Its  blessed  beam  at  last  across  the  gloom, — 
A  cloud  by  day,  a  fire  by  night,  it  glows, 

Hope's  pilot  pillars  that  my  path  illume. 

Oh,  if  it  be  Thy  will  that  I  should  make 
My  way  from  out  the  durance  of  despair, 

Though  to  full  strength  I  never  may  attain, 
Yea,  even  though  these  links  I  may  not  break, 
Let  me  remember  still  in  grateful  prayer 
The    Love    that   for   a   season    loosed    the 
chain. 


183 


THE   LOOM 

A  WEARIED  weaver  at  the  loom,  I  gaze 

On  that  which  I  have  woven  till  mine  eyes 
Grow  dim  to  see  the  fabric  it  displays ; 

The  warp  of  all  my  work  seems  woofed  with 
sighs. 

No  more  for  me  Life's  shuttle  swiftly  flies, 
But  falters  feebly  through  the  fibred  maze 

As  thread  on  thread  it  slowly  multiplies, 
Weaving,  alas  !  a  weft  of  dreary  days. 

For  in  the  woven  meshes  there  appears 

The  sombre  shade  of  sorrow.     Do  I  weave 

But  sackcloth  for  my  soul  ?    And  am  I  now 
But  one  who  gloats  upon  the  garb  he  wears, — 

Who  in  the  shadow  sits  apart  to  grieve, 
•      The  ashes  of  his  life  upon  his  brow  ? 


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